It was a bittersweet Sunday for Indian trap exponents as they came up with fine performances in men’s and women’s team categories, clinching gold and silver respectively, before imploding in the individual events with only Kynan Chenai managing a bronze.

With three medals in trap on the last day of shooting competition, India will return home with an amazing haul of 22 shooting medals — seven gold, nine silver and six bronze — their best ever in the continental showpiece.

The Indian men’s team, comprising the triumvirate of Prithviraj Tondaiman (119), Kynan Chenai (122) and Zoravar Singh Sandhu (120), won the gold medal with an Asian Games record of 361 in the qualification.

Kynan and Zoravar also qualified for the six-shooter finals for individual glory placed first and second respectively, raising hopes of a gold-silver finish.

But both marksmen slipped badly in the finals, with Kynan managing an individual bronze after being in contention for silver, while Zoravar, a veteran, finished a distant fifth shooting 23 clay birds out of 30.

The women’s trap team — (above, from left) Rajeshwari Kumari, Manisha Keer and Preeti Rajak — clinched silver. AP/PTI

Zoravar had competed in his 1998 Asian Games in Bangkok where he had finished sixth, while at the 2010 Guangzhou Asian Games he had finished 28th. The 46-year-old veteran missed three shots in his last series.

Kynan though chugged along before he lost his rhythm in the last three series of five shots each, missing five clay pigeons to settle for bronze with a score of 32/40. Just before that, the trio of Manisha Keer (114), Preeti Rajak (112) and Rajeshwari Kumari (111) claimed the silver medal in women’s trap team event aggregating 337.

China’s Qingnian Li, Cuicui Wu and Xinqiu Zhang shot a world and games record score of 357 to finish on top of the podium, while Kazakhstan’s Mariya Dmitriyenko, Aizhan Dosmagambetova and Anastassiya Prilepina (336) bagged bronze.

Manisha also entered the six-shooter finals placed fifth after a shoot-off with two others on 114.

Long-jumper Murali Sreeshankar in action on Sunday. PTI photo

Murali jumps to silver

India’s Murali Sreeshankar leapt to a silver finish in the men’s long jump competition at the Asian Games on Sunday.

Sreeshankar's best jump was 8.19m. He finished second to China’s Wang Jianan, who topped the charts with a 8.22m jump. Wang is a silver medallist from the World Championships held in Budapest in August.

Sreeshankar had a disappointing outing at the World Championships and the Asian Games provided him with an opportunity to make a statement. His personal and season’s best jump of 8.41m puts him in the fourth spot in the world and second among Asians behind compatriot Jeswin Aldrin.

But while Sreeshankar soared to silver, Aldrin had an extremely poor day as he finished eighth with a best jump of 7.76m.

Sreeshankar began poorly on Sunday, but he picked up his performance as the completion progressed. That was not the case with Aldrin. While Sreeshankar started with a foul jump, his best jump came in his fourth attempt.

This, for the record, was the first long jump medal for India since the 1978 Asian Games.

With inputs from PTI