London 2012 Olympics: Day 3 highlights for Team India, Team GB

Team India Highlights:

Shooting:

India laid claims to its first medal at London 2012 Olympic Games on Monday, July 30 in the 10m air rifle competition. Ace shooter Gagan Narang gave India its first medal after winning a bronze for the rifle event. Romania’s Moldoveanu Alin George won the gold and Italy’s Niccolo Campriani won silver for the competition.

But in the same event, Beijing Olympics gold winner and India’s best bet at London 2012, Abhinav Bindra, ended at 16th position out of a total of 47 contestants. Bindra suffered an exit in the preliminary round.

Badminton:

India’s Badminton star, Saina Nehwal notched up an easy win against Belgian Lianne Tan in a group stage match on July 30 to win a place in the knockout stage. Nehwal beat Tan 21-4 21-14 at the Wembley arena. She is likely to face Yao Jie of The Netherlands in the next stage.

Tennis:
Mahesh Bhupathi and Rohan Bopanna have qualified to play the men's doubles pre-quarterfinals after they beat Max Mirnyi and Alexander Bury from Belarus 7-6 (4) 6-7 (4) 8-6 on Monday, July 30.

Indian duo - Bhupathi-Bopanna - will now play France’s Julien Benneteau and Richard Gasquet.

But it was not all wins for India as India’s Vishnu Vardhan was defeated by Slovenia's Blaz Kavcic in the first round of men’s singles tennis on Monday.

Vardhan qualified to play men’s singles only after Phillip Kohlschreiber from Germany pulled out after suffering an injury. The Indian player, however, committed too many unforced errors before losing to Kavcic.

It was bad news for India in women’s tennis doubles too. India’s duo Sania Mirza and Rushmi Chakravarthi lost to Chinese Taipei pair of Su Wei Hsieh and Chia-Jung Chuang. Mirza-Chakravarthi pair has been knocked out of the women's doubles competition of London 2012 Olympics following the defeat. 

Hockey:
Indian hockey team put up a tough fight but eventually lost to The Netherlands (2-3) in their opening Group B match of the men's hockey competition on July 30.

While India was off to a bad start conceding two goals to the Dutch team, the Indian hockey team picked up momentum in the second half to draw 2-2 against their rivals. But they couldn’t keep pace and conceded another goal losing to The Netherlands. India will now play New Zealand in their second Group B match on Wednesday, August 1.

Team GB highlights:

Gymnastics:

In a dramatic turn of events, Great Britain’s men won a bronze medal in the gymnastics final round. Team GB - Sam Oldham, Louis Smith, Dan Purvis, Max Whitlock and Kristian Thomas - originally took silver but later was left with bronze after the Japanese men made an appeal for the silver medal.

This was team GB’s first Olympic team medal in 100 years. China won the gold medal and Japan, who were initially placed in fourth, took the silver after an appeal.

Basketball:
Great Britain’s women's side lost to Canada (73-65), despite putting up a tough fight.

Although team GB trailed team Canada for much of the game, they were not too far behind and even tied the scores at 61-61. But they couldn’t fight back Canada in the last four minutes. Britain’s women next face Russia who have won both their opening games.

Diving:
Britain’s medal hopeful Tom Daley and his partner Peter Waterfield ended fourth with 454.65 points in the men's synchronised 10m platform final, missing out on the medals. China, Mexico and team USA took home gold (486.78 points), silver (468.90) and bronze (463.47) respectively in the synchronized swimming competition.

Equestrian:
Team GB’s equestrian contenders are in second position with only the show jumping left to go. Kristina Cook is the top ranking competitor at fifth place followed by Mary King at sixth position. Zara Phillips is at number 10, Nicola Wilson at 20 and William Fox-Pitt is 22nd.

Hockey:
Great Britain’s men’s hockey team scored an impressive victory over Argentina (4-1) with Barry Middleton’s commendable netting for the team.

Swimming:
It wasn’t a great day for the swimming teams of Great Britain. In swimming, Liam Tancock ended fifth in the men's 100m backstroke final; while Robbie Renwick finished sixth in the men's 200m freestyle final.