Antalya Archery World Cup: India return empty-handed as Simranjeet loses to Olympic champion

India ended their campaign at the 2025 Archery World Cup in Antalya, Turkey empty handed, as Simranjeet Kaur bowed out in the women's individual recurve quarter-finals with a loss at the hands of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics champion An San of South Korea.

Simranjeet, the only Indian recurve archer to reach the quarter-finals, went down 5-6 in a hard-fought battle against the Korean.

Simranjeet started off brilliantly, shooting 29 in the first set compared to An's 28 to open up an early 2-0 lead.

The Indian, however, had a horrid second set, shooting 9, 9, 6 with her three arrows for a meagre total of 24 as An fought back to level the scores.

Simranjeet won the third set 27-24, before the two archers shot 27 apiece in the fourth.

Leading 5-4 heading into the final set, Simranjeet just needed a tie to pocket the contest. However, she crumbled under pressure.

She shot a disappointing 5 with her final arrow in the match, shooting a total of 23. An, meanwhile, shot an 11, 10, 8 off her three arrows for a combined 29 to win the match.

Meanwhile, Ankita Bhakat took an exit in the women's recurve first round whereas the experienced Deepika Kumari was blanked 0-6 in the second round.

Elsewhere in the men's individual recurve event, veteran Tarundeep Rai failed to proceed to the second round while Dhiraj Bommadevara and Atanu Das faced losses in the second round.