Despite Sagor Islam's impressive straight qualification for the Paris Olympics, Bangladesh's men's recurve team were eliminated from the World Cup Archery team competition on Thursday in Turkey.
The team, consisting of Rubel, Ram and Islam, secured 13th place in the ranking round, progressing to the elimination stage. However, they suffered a narrow defeat to Japan in the 1/12 eliminator, which was decided by a shoot-off.
Bangladesh started the day brightly, defeating Japan in the first set of the encounter. The second set was drawn, leaving the score tied at 2-2. The Bangladeshi archers kept their hopes alive by winning the third set, but Japan responded in kind to force a shoot-off at 4-4.
Unfortunately, Bangladesh fell short in the shoot-off, scoring 24 points compared to Japan's 27. This ended their participation in the team event.
The women's individual and mixed team events also failed to progress beyond the first day, leaving the men's individual competition as Bangladesh's sole remaining hope at the World Cup.
On a brighter note, Sagor Islam became Bangladesh's third athlete and second archer to qualify directly for the Olympics. He joins golfer Siddikur Rahman (Rio 2016) and archer Ruman Shana (Tokyo 2020) in this prestigious feat.
Islam secured his Paris 2024 berth on Monday after reaching the semi-finals of the men's recurve individual event at Stage 3 of the Archery World Cup in Turkey, having earlier claimed a silver medal in the final.
