Surendra Bhandari wins taekwondo bronze

India's Surendra Bhandari won a bronze medal in the men's flyweight [58kg] in taekwondo at the Asian Games on Friday.

He lost to K Khodad of Iran 1-4 in the semi-finals but was awarded the bronze along with the other losing semi-finalist, Tshomlee Go.

In the final, Behzad will meet Dae Ryung Kim of Korea, who defeated Tshomlee of The Phillipines 6-1.

Bhandari had a first round bye. He beat Kumar Bahadur Karki of Nepal 3-0 in the second round and the scored over Anas Hamood Aqlan of Yemen on superiority, after both fighters were tied 3-3 in the third round.

Otherwise, the other Indian martial art experts made mess of their showing, proving no match for more experienced opponents.

Besides Bhandari, only Mohammed Imran could win a match. He got the better of Habib Zarifeh of Libya in the second round of the men's finweight (54 kg) category. He won a point in Kyoinggo> and three in Deukjum, while his opponent could reply with only two points in Deukjum .

In the third round, however, the 19-year-old from Bangalore was routed 10-1 by Mu Yen Chu of Chinese Taipei.

Praban Saikia of Delhi, who got a bye in the first two rounds, lost 2-5 to Jae Shin Lee of South Korea in the third round of the men's lightweight up to 72 kg event.

In the women's finweight (47 kg) category, Seema Deswal from Haryana failed to win even a single point against her South Korean rival Ji Hyn Kang, who scored three points, all in Deukjum.