Pooja enters finals of U-23 World Wrestling Championships

Budapest : Indian women grappler Pooja Gehlot (53kg) entered the finals after beating Turkey's Zeynep Yetgil in the semifinals of the UWW Under-23 World Championships here on Thursday.

Pooja scripted a superb come back as she fought her way from a 2-4 deficit to win 8-4 against Yetgil, a gold medallist at the Junior European Wrestling Championships in 2018.

In the summit clash on Friday, Pooja will be up against Haruno Okuno of Japan. No Indian has ever won a gold in the last three editions of the UWW Under-23 World Championships.

Ravinder had settled for a silver medal on Wednesday after going down to Kyrgyzstan's Ulukbek Zholdoshbekov in the 61kg final. It was a fantastic display from the youngster who started from the qualifying stages, where she demolished Ekaterina Verbina of Russia 8-3.

In the quarter-finals, Gehlot blazed through her bout, notching up a commanding 8-0 win to set up a semi-final showdown against Zeynep Yetgil, gold medallist at the Junior European Wrestling Championships in 2018.

Gehlot is the second Indian woman wrestler to remain in contention for a medal after Jyoti (50kg) made it to the bronze medal contest, which is also scheduled to take place tonight.

In 50kg, Jyoti's hopes of getting a bronze were dashed when she was blanked 0-10 by Russia's Nadezhda Sokolova.

In 57kg, Pinki Rani advanced to the quarters from the qualifiers after registering a one-sided 5-0 victory over Arian Geralin Carpio of the USA.

Her run came to an end in the last-eight at the hands of Hannah Fay Taylor, who edged her 2-1 in a gritty contest.