AFI announces Indian squad for Asian Athletics Championships 2025
AFI announces Indian squad for Asian Athletics Championships 2025
Despite achieving the qualification standard and finishing third in the National Federation Athletics Championships, which concluded here on Thursday, sprinter Manikanta Hoblidhar does not find a place in the 100m in the Indian team for next month’s Asian Championships in Gumi, South Korea.
Karnataka’s Manikanta had broken the 100m meet record in the semifinal, clocking 10.25s, which is also the qualification standard set by the Athletics Federation of India for the Asians but the selectors were not impressed.
“Had he finished first or second, he would have been considered,” explained National chief coach Radhakrishnan Nair after the team was announced here on Friday.
“We have also not included Gurindervir Singh who clocked 10.20s (breaking the national record) in the recent Indian Grand Prix in Bengaluru because he finished last in the Federation Nationals (with 11.21).”
Incidentally, Mankanta had clocked 10.22s in that Bengaluru meet.
World champion javelin thrower Neeraj Chopra, who will be in action in the Neeraj Chopra Classic in Bengaluru on May 24, will not be going for the Asian Championships which begin in Korea on May 27.
Asian and Asian Games champion Tajinderpal Singh Toor is one of the prominent names missing from the list. The former Asian record-holder (personal best 21.77m, 2023), who has been struggling with injuries the last couple of years, suffered his first loss in nearly eight years finishing second in the Federation Nationals here on Thursday with 18.77m (AFI’s Asian qualification standard: 19.10m)
While announcing the team for the Asians, AFI president Bahadur Singh Sagoo revealed that the federation will not include athletes who qualify for this September’s Tokyo World Championships through the world rankings route at the last minute, after the withdrawal of athletes above them in the world ranking list. But the selectors will have the final say on the matter.
Here’s the complete squad:
Animesh Kujur
Anu Kumar, Krishan Kumar
Yoonus Shah
Avinash Sable
Gulveer Singh, Abhishek Pal
m: Gulveer Singh, Sawan Barwal
mp: Praveen Chithravel, Abdulla Aboobacker
Sarvesh Kushare
Sachin Yadav, Yash Vir Singh
Samardeep Singh
Tejaswin Shankar
Servin Sebastian, Amit
Pranav Pramod, Animesh Kujur, Manikanta Hoblidhar, Amlan Borgohain, Tamilarasu, Ragul Kumar, Gurindervir Singh
Vishal TK, Jay Kumar, Manu TS, Dharamveer Chaudhary, Rince Joseph, Tushar Kanti, Santosh Kumar, Mohit Kumar
: Nithya Gandhe
: Rupal Chaudhary, Vithya Ramraj
: Twinkle Chaudhary, Pooja
Lili Das, Pooja
: Parul Chaudhary, Ankita
: Sanjivani Baburao, Parul Chaudhary
: Sanjivani Baburao, Seema
: Jyothi Yarraji
: Vithya Ramraj, Anu R
: Shaili Singh, Ancy Sojan
: Nandini Agasara
Nithya Gandhe, Abhinaya Rajarajan, Sneha S, Srabani Nanda, Daneshwari, V Sudeeksha
: Rupal, Sneha K, Subha Venkatesan, Jisna Mathew, Kunja Rajitha, Sandramol Sabu
Published on Apr 25, 2025
