Swapnil Kusale wins silver in men's rifle 3P, his first individual ISSF World Cup medal

Indian shooter Swapnil Kusale won a silver medal in men's 50m rifle 3 positions (3P) event at ISSF World Cup in Baku, Azerbaijan on Thursday, giving country its second medal of competition.

26-year-old Swapnil went down 10-16 to Rio Olympics silver winner Serhiy Kulish of Ukraine in gold medal match. This was Swapnil's first individual ISSF World Cup stage medal.

12-member Indian rifle squ now has one gold and one silver, moving up to fifth on medal table from overnight ninth.

Swapnil played a tremendous 3P match over two days of intense competition in a world class field.

He first finished second to Kulish in top-eight ranking round earlier on Thursday, before going down to Ukranian champion again in gold medal match.

Kulish shot 411 in ranking round to Swapnil's 409.1 as Finland's Aleksi took bronze with 407.8.

top two refore finished in same order right from qualification rounds on Wednesday.

In final, Swapnil did put up a fight but Ukranian finished strong to put issue beyond Indian.

Kulish shot four high 10s in his last five shots of final to Swapnil's three low 10s and two 9s. PTI ATK PDS PDS