The Indian Equestrian Tent Pegging Team returned today with 3 Gold Medals in major Equestrian Events at the ITPF World Cup in Egypt.
India won 3 major events including Team Tent Pegging Lance, Team Tent Pegging Sword and Individual Sword competitions.
Mr. Brijesh Mathur, the Chief of Indian Delegation to Egypt informed that the competition was the toughest so far with the 11 best teams of the world in contention for medals and total points. The Indian Team was able to fetch only Gold Medals.
Mr. Mathur informed that India’s Ajay Sawant got the maximum i.e. 3 Gold Medals followed by Suresh Kumar and Pardeep Kumar who won 2 Gold Medals each, whereas Jaswinder Singh and Wangtham Lammaty with 1 Gold Medal each.
Mr. Mathur said that he was happy that all members of the Indian Team were able to get medals that too Gold in their Quest for a mark at the World Cup. The same team had won 5 Gold Medals and 2 Silver medals at the ITPF World Qualifiers in Abu Dhabi in December 2015.
Though we did not win the World Cup, which went to Egypt because of their consistent performance and home ground and horses’ advantage, but the Indian team emerged with maximum Gold medals by any team, said Mr. Brijesh Mathur. We could have bettered our performance and won the World Cup but in draw of horses, two of our horses were not up to the mark for an international event. We though continued without protest to demonstrate Sportsmanship Spirit.
Mr. Ahmad Afsar, the Coach and Manager of Indian Team was unperturbed by the fact that India missed on to win the World Cup. “Most of the teams had fielded the same lot of players that they have trained and playing for the past 6-7 years, whereas our team was selected on the basis of National Championship in 2015, and considerably a newer team with less international exposure. Despite that we won the Abu Dhabi Qualifiers and 3 major events Gold Medals at the World Cup.â€
Col. R.K. Swain, Secretary General of Equestrian Federation of India (EFI) was Happy that the team won Gold Medals in major events. He was thankful of Sports Authority of India (SAI) and Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports (MYAS) for their continuous support for Equestrian Tent Pegging. He had a special mention of the National Coach Mr. Ahmad Afsar for bringing laurels for the country and rejuvenating India’s medals tally at International level for Equestrian Sports. He also thanked Mr. Brijesh Mathur for helping Indian Team make a mark in the International circuit.
The team was received early morning at Delhi Airport by Col. R K Swain and other officials of the federation.
India now plans to host Asian and International Equestrian Tent Pegging Championship in association with Equiwings Sports in December this year.
