German women to shoot for gold at home stage of international circuit

Lisa Unruh, Elena Richter and Michelle Kroppen of Germany beat Korea’s An San, Jeon Ina and Jung Dasomi in a tiebreak to secure a spot in the recurve women’s team gold medal match on home soil at the 2019 Hyundai Archery World Cup stage in Berlin.

“Totally [excited]! We are very looking forward to the final because it’s the third competition we have in Berlin and we finally made it,” said Elena. “It was about time to show German fans who we are.”

The teams split the set points over the four-set match and a shoot-off was required to decide the winner. Just before the teams took to the line, the wind picked up.

Korea shot first and landed a four, followed by an eight and a nine. Elena scored a six with Germany’s first arrow before Michelle and Lisa followed up with two perfect arrows.

“The shoot-off was very exciting because during the first arrow for us, and the Koreans as well, it was really, really windy and it was tough,” explained Lisa.

“Elena struggled a bit. She went down for the arrow, the Koreans shot, and it looked like it was far away from the middle. I told Elena, ‘strong, do a strong shot’ and then it was good for us. We closed it with two 10s.”

Unruh, Richter and Kroppen also won their first elimination match against Great Britain in a shoot-off and then beat Japan, 5-3, to face Korea in the semifinals.

It is the first time since the Hyundai Archery World Cup came to Berlin in 2017 that the German ladies will contest a gold medal match on home soil. Their opponent for the final is Italy, who upset first seed Chinese Taipei in three sets, 5-1.

“It’s always nice to shoot in Germany and in our home city. We tried over the past two years and now we are absolutely happy to be in the gold medal match on Sunday, and we will enjoy it,” added Michelle.

Both German compound teams – the men and the women – will shoot for bronze in Berlin against squads representing the USA.

The fourth stage of the 2019 Hyundai Archery World Cup takes place on 1-7 July in Berlin, Germany.