India archer Bombayla Devi moves up ~ Olympic losses and twitter comments !!

In the 3^rd Test at Gros Islet, Ravichandran Ashwin completed his 2^nd century of the Series while Wridhiman Saha made his maiden ton.  This test saw 3 changes in Indian Team – in walked Rohit Sharma, Ravindra Jadeja and Bhuvaneswar Kumar. Rohit Sharma's last Test for India, before this was  at the Feroz Shah Kotla in December 2015, against South Africa. In the first innings, batting at No. 6, he was dropped at slip on 1, off Kyle Abbott, and was out to the next ball he faced, trying to hit Dane Piedt over the top when he had a fielder back at long-on. In the second innings, he was promoted to No. 3, and was bowled first ball by a Morne Morkel jaffa.  Here, Rohit again failed edging … and someone could easily have commented – Murali Vijay would have left that gracefully or Cheteshwar Pujara would have watched it all the way ! neither of them are playing !

In Aug 2011, in a Test match – England claimed badlight – Ex opener of England,  Geoffrey Boycott mocked the decision to come off. "You're queuing up to bat against (Suresh) Raina in this light," Boycott said - "My grandmother could have played him with a stick of rhubarb."

Can you recognise this beauty ! – not any model.  Elina Mykhaylivna Svitolina is a Tennis player from Ukraine.  Svitolina has got four WTA titles to her name to date. Yet not many of us would have instantly identified her, earlier !!

At Rio Olympics, Phelps, the American swimmer won his 20^th Olympic gold medal with victory in the 200m butterfly final and in doing so became the oldest individual swimming gold medallist in Olympic history.  A while later, in the  men's 4x200m relay, USA get it done and Phelps claimed gold No.21

Virtually assured of a quarterfinal spot after their morale-boosting win against Argentina, a buoyant India will face world number two side the Netherlands in a tough pool B clash in the Rio Olympics in Rio de Janeiro on Thursday. The target now will be to finish the league stages as high as possible in the points table so as to avoid the world number one Australia in the last eight fixture.

India archer Bombayla Devi beat Austria’s Laurence Baldauff in the women’s 1/64 individual elimination event today. After a disappointing team campaign, India finally had a reason to cheer as their archers continued to put up a good show in individual events. It was Atanu Das on Tuesday, and Devi on Wednesday. The 6-2 win takes Devi to the next round where she takes on Shin-Chia Lin later in the day.

Earlier, in the team campaign, India were up against world champions Russia in the quarters and the trio of Laxmirani Majhi, Bombayla Laishram, Deepika Kumari did well to test the formidable unit and take them to shootoff but they would have been disappointed with the result since they were two sets up after the end of the first three sets. Russia showed why they are the world champs as they not only sealed the fourth set, but also the shootoff to book a semi-final spot.

Bombayla Devi Laishram is from Manipur and has represented India at the 2008 Beijing Olympics in the women's individual as well as team events. At the 2012 London Olympics, she bowed out in the second round of the women’s individual recurve event losing 2-6 to Mexico’s Aída Románon.   

India is yet to open account in medals ~ there can be criticism. Yet one needs to know  Olympic spirit is best expressed  as :"The most important thing in the Olympic Games is not to win but to take part, just as the most important thing in life is not the triumph but the struggle. The essential thing is not to have conquered but to have fought well."

There will always be criticism ~ some arm-chair critics, whose negativity would say that, this should have been done this way and not how it was done.  One can understand the common negative man standing in a street corner or some rustic place uttering comment – writers all call themselves intelligent and capable of ruling the globe.  Then there are social networking – twitter, Facebook and the like, which makes Yours Truly and everyone else feel that they are good in writing, irrespective whether they know the subject or capable of performing well in the field, of which they are so critical. 

In Cricket when two teams play, selection of the team could be for no reason or commercial considerations.  Olympics is far different; every competitor has to excel and be within the norm.  Entry is never a chance ~ but meticulously planned, trained, aspired and exhibited work.  When India was losing another, a writer – Shobhaa De decided to vent her frustration.   "Goal of Team India at the Olympics: Rio jao, selfies lo, khaali haat wapas aao (Go to Rio, click selfies, return home empty handed). What a waste of money and opportunity," she posted on twitter. 

Certainly not one to be relished. If De thought she was expressing the views, she was mistaken.   Those competitors go through very hard grind.  Abhinav Bindra, who  narrowly missed out on a medal on Monday, was quick to defend the performances of his fellow Olympians. There are many who have supported sportspersons, posting against the so called writer. 

The inexplicable can happen in tennis, Serena Williams too lost. Spraying errors and piling up double-faults at an uncharacteristic rate, Williams made a stunningly lethargic exit from Rio on Tuesday, losing 6-4, 6-3 to Elina Svitolina of Ukraine in the women’s singles Round of 16 in a swift 72 minutes.  After winning golds in singles and doubles at the 2012 London Olympics, Williams heads home from Brazil with nothing. She and her older sister Venus, who sat in the stands Tuesday, lost in the first round of doubles — their first defeat in the Olympics after going 15-0 with three golds.

.. .. .. fortunately, there aren’t any criticising her performance badly.

With regards – S. Sampathkumar.

10^th Aug 2016 @ 22:52 hrs.