Japanese women impregnable in Asian Wrestling Championship

Sakshi, Vinesh Phogat and Divya Kakran lost to Japanese wrestlers in the gold-medal bouts of their respective weight divisions to settle for silver medals in the ongoing Asian Championship.

It was the Rio Olympics gold medallist of 63kg category, Risako Kawai, who outplayed Sakshi in the final of 60kg, while another Rio Games champion Sara Dosho defeated Divya Kakran in women’s 69kg.

Neither Sakshi nor Divya could sustain for the entire duration of six minutes during their bouts, and although Vinesh gave a good fight to her rival Sae Nanjo, she also proved no match in the final analysis. 

“It is very difficult to beat the Japanese girls. It will be tough to match them in this lifetime or even the next. We would have to take rebirths in order to beat them. They are simply too good,” Sakshi said. 

Asked to point out the areas in which the Japanese score over others, Sakshi said: “It is a combination of a lot of things. The facilities provided to them, the way their coaches take note of even the minor mistakes they make during a bout. They are very systematic and methodical in their approach.Moreover, they are much more superior even when it comes to their skills and technique,” explained the 24-year-old. 

Vinesh feels that it is their speed and agility that sets the Japanese apart from the rest.“They are extremely agile and move very fast on the mat. It is their speed that we are unable to match most of the times. We will have to increase our speed immensely in order to pose a competition to them,” said Vinesh. 

The 19-year-old rookie Divya agreed with both her senior colleagues, saying be it speed, skills or the technique, the Japanese are better in every way. 

“I was applying all tactics in my book during my gold medal bout against Sara but she was simply far more superior. Tomar said. Tomar said even the girls are not available for training,” noted Divya.