Great Britain end women’s team medal drought in Antalya

Great Britain returned to their 2022 form in the compound women’s team bronze medal match, beating home country Türkiye via shoot off.

Layla Annison, Isabelle Carpenter hadn’t won a team medal for two years whilst world number one Ella Gibson’s previous was silver in the Lilleshall 2023 European Grand Prix.

But in Antalya, world number one Gibson’s nine ended her teammates medal droughts in the shoot-off after the score was tied 232-232.

Munich 2022 gold medallist Carpenter was ecstatic after winning the bronze. “It was quite overwhelming. It’s been a long time coming this medal for us. We’ve come close a couple of times so, it’s nice to get on the podium.” 

It was also a new order for this particular trio which Carpenter believes was a factor in their success. “We’ve tried the same order twice and we haven’t medalled twice, so odds on we thought we needed to try something new and one way or another it’s not going to get worse.

“We though to try something, see if there’s improvement so, we switched it up a little bit, tried something new and it worked out.”

The gold medal final was also confirmed at the Centennial Archery Field in the morning session as Estonia got sweet revenge on USA in the compound women’s team eliminations in Antalya.

Lisell Jaatma, Meeri-Marita Paas and Maris Tetsmann agonisingly lost by a point in the Yecheon 2024 quarterfinals but made up for it in Türkiye convincingly beating their American counterparts 234-227.

A delighted Paas, who was also in the team that lost the Shanghai 2024 bronze medal match to Kazakhstan, revealed what she felt was behind the massive improvement.

“Our teamwork today was good even though there were some questionable arrows, but we still made it and we’re super happy. We haven’t had a good season so far just unlucky so, I guess all the luck came here and we did it.”

On what avenging the loss meant, Paas with a wry smile simply said, “It’s sweet, revenge is sweet.” They have a tough ask ahead however with the formidable India also booking their spot in the final, meaning they have qualified for every gold medal Hyundai World Cup match this year. 

India’s compound men team on the other hand couldn’t repeat the success of their female teammates losing a semifinal to Türkiye before the bronze medal match to France.

Prathamesh Bhalchandra Fuge, Priyansh and Abhishek Verma couldn’t hide their disappointment, it is now consecutive bronze medal losses following Yecheon where they lost to Australia. 

Bangkok 2023 champion Priyansh was still proud of his team’s overall effort. “It was basically hard luck. We shot very well, and it was one of our best performances. The score would have been very nice if we shot fewer nines but most of it was very nice.”

Türkiye will face Italy in the gold medal final and after winning silver in Yecheon will be aiming to go one further in their home field.

Batuhan Akcaoglu was in perfect form, shooting only 10s in the semifinal against India. The Umag 2023 European Grand Prix winner screamed in joy when the result was confirmed and said what Antalya meant for him.

“This is the happiest we have been because it’s our hometown and this is our field. We are so proud to wear the uniform in Türkiye and we celebrated to be on the podium.”

“I trust my team and coaches so, I guess we will do the same in the gold medal match now. It’s our time,” he added.

Competition in Antalya continues this afternoon with recurve qualifying.