Geeta in hunt for a bronze at London Olympics

[1]

Country's lone woman wrestler, Geeta Phogat remained in the medal hunt in 55kg freestyle category despite losing her pre-quarterfinal bout after her vanquisher Tonya Lynn Verbeek of Canada reached the final at the Olympic Games here on Thursday.

Geeta, who lost 1-3 to Verbeek, will be in the reckoning for a bronze medal in the repechage round.

The 23-year-old Haryana girl will have to beat Tetyana Lazareva of Ukraine in the first bout of the repechage round before locking horns with Columbia's Jackeline Renteria Castillo for the bronze.

Geeta earlier threw away an advantageous position in the first period of her pre-quarterfinal bout against Verbeek as she failed to make the most of the clinch awarded in her favour.

The 2010 Commonwealth Games gold-medallist raised her performance and won the second period 1-0 to level the scores.

But Verbeek, who has an Olympic silver and bronze medal to her credit, relied on all her experience to turn the table on the Indian in the third and decisive period of the match.

Verbeek went on to beat Lazareva in the quarterfinal before making a light work of Castillo in the semifinal.