India’s Bajrang Punia has made it to the Semifinals of 65kg category. He trailed in the 1st round and got the warning again in the 2nd. However, in a dramatic turnaround, Punia managed to pin his opponent and win the quarterfinals. After Punia escaped defeat against Akmataliev, he has won in an impressive fashion against Iran’s Morteza by pinning him.
Bajrang will now face Rio 2016 bronze medallist Haji Aliyev of Azerbaijan in the semi-finals. The number two seed Indian started the cagey contest on the back foot as he conceded a shot clock for passivity and gave one point to Morteza Ghiasi Cheka going into the second period. He earlier beat Kazakhstan’s Ernazar Akmataliev in the pre-quarters by criteria. Bajrang raced to a 3-1 lead in the first period of his first round bout. Akmataliev, however, came back by pushing Bajrang out of bounds twice in the second period. Bajrang somehow managed to defend the last eight seconds successfully, thus taking the bout on criteria with the scoreline 3-3. Bajrang is one of India’s biggest medal hopes from the wrestling contingent at the Tokyo Games. He won gold at the 2018 Asian Games then won silver at the 2019 World Championships. The latter result helped him qualify for Tokyo 2020.
