Jayanta flies to Mexico for World Archery Championship finals

New Delhi, Oct 18 (UNI) Buoyed with his recent encouraging scores, Jayanta Talukdar flies to Mexico tonight, hoping to shine in the finals of the World Archery Championship scheduled at Merida, Mexico, during October 21-23.

Jayanta topped the first World Cup at Perec, Croatia but struggled in the windy conditions in the second leg at Antalya, Turkey where he finished fifth. The Indian could not compete in the El Salvadore World Cup after being denied visa but his score was good enough to qualify for Mexico as the third ranked player in a four-horse race.

''I'm quite confident, especially seeing my recent scores. Though it might get windy at Merida (Mexico) and you generally need luck in such conditions, I have beaten two of the three guys there and and there is no reason why I can't do well,'' asserted Jayanta.

Jayanta has a winner's purse of 20,000 dollar dangled before him, while the runners up in the tournament gets richer by 10,000 dollar.

Finishing third would earn 5000 dollar while the fourth placed archer will pocket 1000 dollar.

Apart from Jayanta, who made it as third ranked archer, three others to reach the finals are Italian Deboe, Olympic multiple Gold medallist Park Kyung Mo of Korea and Sweden's Magnus Peterson.

Jayanta has bright chances in the event, considering he has beaten both the Italian and the Swedish player in Croatia, while he lost to Park by just one point in the quarterfinals in Turkey.

Congratulating the archer for his achievement, Archery Association of India (AAI) President Vijay KUmar Malhotra today wished him the best but rued that despite the players delivering the goods, they are victims of government apathy and revealed AAI was being forced to borrow money to buy equipments for the Asian Games.

''Rs 40 crore was gone in five minutes in the Commonwealth Games closing ceremony. They can spend Rs 40 crore for that but can't clear out Rs 40 lakh dues. After they sanctioned the money, we submitted the utilisation certificates and still the money is pending.

''We are left with no means but to borrow Rs 15 lakh to buy new equipments for the archers who are preparing for the Doha Asian Games. Billions are being spent on infrastructure for the 2010 Commonwealth Games but is anyone bothered about athletes' preparation?'' he asked.

UNI AY AB BST1905