Commonwealth Games champion and Olympian Deepak Punia will not compete at the World Wrestling Championships 2022 which starts on Saturday in Belgrade, Serbia.
According to Sportstar, Deepak Punia, who competes in the 86kg category, fractured his hand at his training base in Michigan, USA, ruling him out of the world championships.
As a result, the Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) conducted trials for the men’s 86kg category and selected 2021 Asian championships bronze-medallist Sanjeet as Deepak Punia’s replacement for the Belgrade meet.
Deepak Punia won the gold medal at CWG 2022 last month. He is also a world junior champion, India’s first in 18 years when he won in 2019.
At his senior world wrestling championships debut in 2019, Deepak Punia had created a stir, making his way to the final, However, an injury prevented him from competing against world and Olympic champion Hassan Yazdani in the final and he ended up with the silver medal.
Deepak Punia had also narrowly missed out on the bronze medal during his Olympics debut at Tokyo 2020.
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