Gaurav Baliyan will fight for gold at the Wrestling Cadet World Championships in Zagreb. The Indian grappler will face Georgia’s Bagrati Gagnidze in the gold medal match in the 71kg freestyle category.
Baliyan reached the final after narrowly defeating Alexander Joseph Facundo of the USA in the semi-final by a 6-5 margin. He earlier defeated Magomedov Makhmud Tazhutinovitch of Russia, Kazakhstan’s Islyambek Ilyassov and Muhammet Cavus of Turkey.
Meanwhile in the 51 kg category, India grappler Aman will face Turkey’s Adem Burak in the bronze medal match. Ravinder (60kg) too will be in contention for bronze as he goes up against Azerbaijan’s Sabir Jafarov.
Earlier, Anirudh Kumar narrowly missed out on bronze in the 110kg category after losing to Russia’s Sergei Kozyrev.
In the women’s category, former champion Sonam lost in the quarter-final stage of the 65kg event after losing 5-1 to Honoka Nakai of Japan. Also, Simran (43kg) lost to Emily King Shilson of the USA in the quarter-final.