Sakshi Malik/ Sakshee Malikkh
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Who is Sakshi Malik?
Image credit: Jack Guez / AFP
Image credit: Jack Guez / AFP
Sakshi Malik: From Rohtak to Rio The Hindu
Weight: 64 kg
Height: 1.62 metres
Born on September 3, 1992, in Rohtak, Haryana, Sakshi Malik has her supportive parents, Sudesh and Sukhbir, to thank for encouraging her in her unusual career choice.
The 23-year-old from Mokhra village began her training in wrestling as a 12-year-old under the guidance of Ishwar Dahiya at an akhara in the Chotu Ram stadium. Her grooming was helped along by having to fight a lot of boys, in a region where the sport was ‘not for girls’. In fact, Dahiya faced protests from locals when he took Sakshi under his wing.
The run-up to Rio
2010: By the age of 18, she had tasted victory at junior-level competitions. She won a Bronze at the 2010 Junior World Championships in the 59-kg category.
2014: She first came to the international limelight after taking home the Gold at the Dave Schultz International Wrestling Tournament (60-kg).
July-August 2014: Her professional international career began with a silver medal in the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, courtesy two 4-0 bouts.
September 2014: She crashed out in the Quarterfinal at the World Wrestling Championships in Tashkent. But not before beating her Senegalese opponent 4-1 in the Round of 16.
May 2015: Then on to the Senior Asian Wrestling Championships in Doha, where she won the Bronze.
On that victory, she said:
“My silver at the 2014 Commonwealth Games is my personal favourite. Although I displayed some aggressive wrestling at the 2015 Asian Championships and clinched a bronze, my bout at Glasgow was more challenging.”
Following that, Sakshi booked her seat on the flight to Rio by winning Bronze in the Summer Olympics Qualifiers, defeating Chinese Lan Zhang in the semifinal, at Istanbul.
July 2016: She won 60-kg Bronze at the Spanish Grand Prix.
Indian Express adds: Sakshi Malik had lived in Geeta Phogat’s shadow from most of her career so far. But she finally got her chance to prove in Olympic qualifying event in Istanbul where she defeated a former world champion to qualifying for Rio. A multiple national champion, Sakshi had to fight boys early in her career and face social issues with women not allowed to participate in wrestling in Haryana. She took up wrestling in 2002 under coach Ishwar Dahiya and since then has won several tournaments including gold medals in national tournaments
2016: The historic bronze medal
Highlights
• Sakshi is the first female wrestler from India to win an Olympic medal
• It's India's first medal at Rio Olympics.
• Sakshi was the fourth female sportsperson from India to win an Olympic medal
Sakshi’s journey to the medal
Making a strong comeback from a 0-4 down, Sakshi defeated Sweden's Malin Johanna Mattsson 5-4 in the qualification round She was down 0-4 after the first period but quickly made amends in the second period. Sakshi managed to pull two points back before pushing her rival out of the mat to grab another point. With just 10 seconds remaining, Sakshi desperately needed one more point to post a win and she held her nerves as she took down the Swedish girl in those dying moments to post a narrow victory.
In the pre-quarters, Sakshi once again eked out a narrow 5-5 win over Mariana Cherdivara Esanu of Republic of Moldova In the opening period of the pre-quarterfinal bout, Sakshi got 30 seconds to earn points but she failed and that gave Cherdivara a point. The girl from Moldova then put Sakshi down on the mat to gain another two points and lead 3-0 at the break. In the second period, the Indian failed to take advantage of the 30 seconds she got and handed Cherdivara another point. Sakshi then came back strongly to post a double take down, which earned her four crucial points at one go and helped her surge ahead to a 5-3 lead. Although Cherdivara, with her own take-down, gained two points to make the scores level at 5-5 with just 19 seconds left on the clock, the Indian was declared winner on bigger points gain.
She lost 2-9 in the quarter-finals to Russia's Valeriia Koblova in the fifth bout of the day, before getting a second chance in repechage when her conqueror reached the final. Having conceded one point in the first period of her quarterfinal fight because of passivity, Sakshi did well to earn two points in the second period after taking-down the Russian girl. But Koblova, with enormous strength, hit back almost immediately to pocket four points and then gained another two to open up a 7-2 lead. The Russian then closed the door on Sakshi by bagging another two points to win the bout and make the semifinals. In the first two rounds, Sakshi came back from behind to register impressive wins.
Sakshi stormed into the bronze medal play-off round with a dominating performance in her repechage round, where she thrashed Purevdorjiin Orkhon of Mongolia 12-3. Both the wrestlers matched each other in the first period and the scores were 2-2 at the break. But Sakshi gave a more aggressive account of herself in the second period, pinning down her opponent from time to time, besides flipping her over for crucial points. Starting with a double-leg take down to earn two points, she added two more crucial points to her kitty to lead 6-3 with a minute left. In the last one minute, she kept attacking and gained four more points. In fact, Sakshi earned as many as 10 points compared to just one by the Mongolian in the second period to seal off the issue in style.
As Sakshi had reached the quarterfinals, she needed to fight only one repechage round as compared to the other two opponents of the Russian girl, whom she had beaten in the earlier two rounds - pre-quarters and qualification.
Koblova had beaten Luisa Niemesch of Germany in the qualification round before defeating Mongolia's Orkhon in the pre-quarterfinals.
Therefore, in the first repechage round, these two grapplers from Germany and Mongolia faced each other. And the winner of that bout (Mongolian girl) then took on Sakshi in repechage round 2 for a place in the bronze medal play-off.
Sakshi had to get the better of the Mongolian grappler in the repechage round 2 and she did just that to advance to the bronze medal play off.
The bout for the bronze medal
Gritty wrestler Sakshi Malik ended India's painful wait for a medal at the Rio Olympic Games by clinching the bronze in the 58kg category, pulling off a sensational 8-5 victory over Aisuluu Tynybekova of Kyrgyzstan in the play-off bout, here.
The 23-year-old from Rohtak became only the fourth woman athlete from India to win an Olympic medal as she earned the dramatic win after falling behind 0-5 in the do-or-die bout on day 12.
Weightlifter Karnam Malleshwari (2000, Sydney), boxer MC Mary Kom (2012, London) and shuttler Saina Nehwal (2012, London) were the only other women athletes from India to have won a medal in Olympics.
Like in three of the four other bouts earlier in the day, Sakshi won the crucial bout after coming from behind. She, in fact, had lost 2-9 in the quarter-finals to Russia's Valeriia Koblova in the fifth bout of the day before getting a second chance in repechage when her conqueror reached the final.
Sakshi turned the tables on the Kyrgyzstan wrestler in the dying seconds of the bout as Tynybekova was in complete command in most part of the clash.
Tynybekova grabbed Sakshi's leg and quickly earned two points before adding one more for the Indian's passivity.
She repeated her move and successfully bagged two more points to lead 5-0 at the break.
Sakshi could open the scoring only in the second period and got two points after throwing her rival down and out of the mat. She then managed to earn two points again with a similar move to bring down the margin to 4-5.
Thereafter, it was no looking back for the Indian girl and she took the opponent down to level the scores 5-5. But she did not stop there and gained three more points by pinning down the Kyrgyzstan wrestler in the dying moments of the match.
In the bronze play-off too Sakshi's winning move that got her two points initially was challenged by her Kyrgyztan rival and it was reviewed and she was awarded an extra point by the judges much to her rival's chagrin.
