Rating India's performance at Paris Olympics 2024

India had a rollercoaster of a journey at the Paris Olympics 2024. India had a contingent of 117 players and each of them was capable of bringing home a medal. It was probably the same reason why many performances seemed to be below par, considering that they were favourites to win medals. The Indian campaign had some ups and downs in the campaign.

It is time to look at India's performance at the Paris Olympics 2024 and rate how they fared.

Teams that brought home medals

Athletics (6/10) 

The athletics team had a tough job without a doubt. However, barring a few of them, others did not live up to the expectations. Neeraj Chopra was indeed the highlight of the team managing to bag a silver medal with the second-best throw of his career. Avinash Sable entered the final of the Men's 3000m Steeplechase event. However, he could not get close to his personal best.

The Men's 4*400m Relay team ran a decent race in the heats. But it was not good enough to be in the final. Parul Chaudhary was impressive in the long running. But others were highly disappointing. Popular athletes like Jyothi Yarraji from Women's Hurdles, Tajinder from Men's Shot Put, long jumpers, triple jumpers, and others gave disappointing performances collectively. 

Shooting (6/10)

The Shooting team had a contingent of 21 players. It was the most for any team in the Paris Olympics 2024. Most of the heavy lifting was done by Manu Bhaker who won the Bronze medals in the Women's 10m Rapid Air Pistol and the Mixed Team event in the same category with Sarabjot Singh. She also ended up being the fourth best in the Women's 25m Rapid Air Pistol event. 

Additionally, Swapnil Kusale won the Bronze medal in the Men's 50m Air Rifle event. There were some close finishes like Arjun Babuta and the Mixed Skeet team who finished fourth in their events respectively. Sift Kaur Samra finished 31st of the 32 participants in her event where she held a world record which was probably the worst show for an Indian athlete in Paris. 

Wrestling (7/10)

After what transpired with the wrestlers before the Olympics, not many expected them to show up in the mega event. But they were one of the highlights of the edition for India. Vinesh Phogat performed the best of the lot. She overcame an unbeaten Yui Susaki and eventually bagged herself a spot in the final. Her disqualification hurt the Indian fans the most. Despite this, India got a medal in wrestling.

In the Men's 57 kg event, Aman Sehrawat bagged the Bronze medal. It meant Wrestling is currently the only team that has provided at least a medal for India in every edition since Beijing 2008. Antim Panghal was the only wrestler who crashed out of the Round of 16. Reetika Hooda and Anshu Malik tried their best but could not proceed further due to their opponents failing to win the semifinal.

Hockey (9/10)

The Men's team was the only team that featured at the Paris Olympics 2024. To be honest, they gave some of the best memories for the fans. With their inspirational efforts, India overcame some of the best teams in the world. After managing to beat New Zealand 3-2 and Ireland 1-0, India managed to draw against Argentina 1-1. The 8-time champions even put in a great performance against Belgium.

Despite going down 1-2, India had control of the match for the most part. Things were only getting difficult from there. India had the difficult challenge of Australia. For the first time since 1972, India beat Australia in Hockey at the Olympics. In the quarterfinal, India put on a terrific show to beat Great Britain with virtually 10 players in their lineup. Despite losing semis to Germany, India won its second consecutive Bronze medal.

Teams that brought home no medal

Archery (3/10)

Despite having some of the best archers in the world, the Indian contingent returned home empty-handed. Despite all the investment in the Sport, not a single archer managed to claim a medal. the best chance India got for a medal was in the Mixed team event. But the duo of Ankita Bhakat and Dhiraj Bommadevara missed a golden opportunity to create history for India.

There were rather some poor performances from individuals. Tarundeep Rai and Deepika Kumari were often inconsistent with their shots on target. They scored 7s and 8s every now and then putting pressure on others. Praveen Jadhav needs to improve too. Bhajan Kaur and Ankita Bhakat showed glimpses of their brilliance but could not be consistent. The best of the lot was Dhiraj who was let down by himself and teammates.

Badminton (4/10)

It was another disappointing outing for India. For the first time since the Beijing Olympics 2012, the Badminton team failed to bring home a medal. PV Sindhu and the pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty crashed out of the quarterfinal stage of the tournament. The former won two medals in her Olympic career. The latter was deemed the absolute favourite for a gold medal.

Despite getting an easy draw till the quarterfinal, the duo could not reach a stage where they could have claimed a medal for themselves. The toughest draw was for Lakshya Sen. The 22-year-old beat Jonatan Christie to enter the Round of 16 where he beat HS Prannoy to enter the quarterfinal. He beat the Chinese Taipei player to enter the semifinal. In the semifinal and the Bronze medal matches, he looked under pressure and failed to finish the games despite being in a dominant position at different points.

Table Tennis (3/10)

The Women's team was easily better than the Men's team that came with arguably the worst performance. Some of the paddlers like Sreeja Akula and Manika Batra did well. They scripted history to become the first individuals to enter the quarterfinal stage of the women's singles. But in the team event, the duo performed badly against a lower-ranked team like Germany after beating the fourth-seeded Hungary.

Sharath Kamal and Harvik Desai had forgettable outcomes and did not put up enough fight. Sreeja had a good chance of putting on a show against the World Number One paddler in the quarterfinal. Despite being 10-5 and 10-6 up in her first two sets, Akula ended up conceding the set. Archana Kamat showed glimpses of her brilliance in the Women's team. But as a team, Indian Table Tennis has a lot to work with.

Boxing (5/10)

The Boxing team had a lot of disadvantages. The draws were unfavourable and the decisions were highly biased against them. Some of the top Boxers who had a good chance of securing medals like Lovlina Borgohain, Nishant Dev, and Nikhat Zareen fell prey to biased judgments. Preeti Pawar and Amit Panghal delivered disappointing performances as they could not put on a show.

Lovlina and Nishant were a win away from securing a medal. Despite doing nothing wrong, the duo could not do much as the referees were biased towards higher-ranked players. Hence, it is a bit difficult to judge how good their campaign was. But those who watched them in action knew how well they were be it on defense or on the attack. It was the last instance of Boxing at the Olympics.

Equestrian (4/10)

There was hardly anything to expect from Anush Aggarwala as he was the first Indian at the Olympics in his event. He finished 52nd but would be hoping to deliver a better show in the future.

Golf (3/10)

Both men's and women's golfers failed to perform well. Aditi Ashok was expected to be among the top 10 if not clinch a medal. But compared to her performance in Tokyo where she finished 4th, Aditi managed a tied 29h spot, nowhere close to her calibre. Diksh Dagar finished with a tied 49th rank. Both of the women's golfers had a bad day 3 which cost them a lot eventually.

In the men's division, the duo of Shubhankar Sharma and Gaganjeet Bhullar finished with a tied 40th and 45th ranks respectively. They were not the favourites to win any medal. Together, the men's and women's divisions ensured India got its biggest representation in terms of numbers at the Golf. But they were not being converted to medals.

Judo (1/10)

India's sole participant in the event was Tulika Mann. In her very first bout, Mann had a challenge to face the former Olympic and world champion Idalys Ortiz. Mann lost to the Cuban in just 28 seconds.

Rowing (5/10)

Balraj Panwar was the sole representative of India in the event. He actually performed well to earn himself a spot in the Semifinal of the Pool D. He finished 23rd overall and showed glimpses of improvement with every passing race.

Sailing (3/10)

India had Vishnu Saravanan and Nethra Kumanan as its representatives. The duo finished 18th and 21st respectively. Despite having an experience of doing well in different events, the duo did not finish in the spots that were expected to, making their campaign not so impressive.

Swimming (3/10)

Swimming is one of those events that can be termed as the most backward events among the ones where we qualify. Srihari Nataraj finished 33rd out of the 46 participants. The 14-year-old Dhinidhi Desinghu was impressive on her debut. She would love to perform better than a 23rd spot in the Los Angeles Olympics 2028.

Tennis (2/10)

Sumit Nagal stood absolutely no chance. His loss in the first round was evident and was not surprising at all. Despite winning a lot of tournaments in 2024, Rohan Bopanna could not manage to perform as well as he would have liked. While his usual partner Matthew Ebden won the gold, Rohan couldn't manage to do anything with his partner Sriram Balaji.

Weightlifting (7/10)

Mirabai Chanu was India's sole representative in the event. Compared to Tokyo, she had a lot of challenges. Returning from the injuries was her biggest concern. Additionally, there were more challenging lifters who emerged from Thailand and Romania. Both of them ended up costing India a potential medal. Mirabai Chanu agonizingly finished fourth in her event.

She lifted the weight of 89 kg in the snatch, the joint third most for an athlete in her weight category. But she would be disappointed to have not been able to give her best in the clean and jerk where she held on to the world record at one point. Despite managing an impressive total lift of 207 kg, Mirabai had to settle for the fourth spot.