India’s Day 2 at Rio: Dipa Karmakar, Kumari, Hockey Team in Action

The Indian women's archery team comprising, Deepika Kumari, Bombayla Devi and Laxmirani Majhi will take on Georgia's Kristine Esebua, Alexandra Longova of Slovakia and Baldauff of Austria respectively at the Rio Olympics on Sunday.

The archery team finished seventh in the ranking round, while individually all of them advanced for the round of 32 on Friday.

Deepika started off well to even hit the top spot in the early rounds before stumbling at the halfway mark to finished 20th with a total score of 640 while Bombayla accumulated 638. Laxmirani ended a disappointing 43rd with a total score of 614.

Kumari will be the cynosure of eyes as she is a medal favourite. The 22-year-old had arrived for the London Olympics as the world number one but unfortunately the entire Indian archery team was down with flu once they reached the venue for the Olympics in 2012 and hence couldn't perform to the best of their abilities.

Therefore, the Ranchi archer will be even more determined to win a medal for India.

Dipa Karmakar, who scripted history by becoming the first Indian female gymnast to qualify for the Rio Olympics, will carry a billion hopes when the women's gymnastics events unfold on Sunday.

The Tripura girl, who is one of the five women in the world who have successfully completed the Produnova vault, a tough front handspring and two front somersaults, said she is under no pressure and will give her best in the event.

Dipa clinched five gold medals at the 2015 National Games in Kerala – in individual all-round, table vault, balancing beam, uneven parallel bars and floor exercises and was one of the top medal winners at the event.

After a fairytale run to the Rio Games following a gap of 36 years, an upbeat Indian women's hockey team will now look to begin from where they had left off against Japan when they clash in their opener in a pool B match on Sunday.

The women's team had beaten the same opponents in a classification match in June last year to finish fifth in the World League semifinals and qualify for the Olympics, for the first time after Moscow 1980.

The tenth ranked Japan may be three notches higher but the women in blue, coached by the Australian Neil Hawgood, are hopeful of a good start to take the momentum forward.

India's 10m air pistol shooter Heena Sidhu will also be in action on the second day of Rio Olympics. After Apurvi Chandela, Ayonika Paul and Jitu Rai's poor show on day one, India will be hoping for a good performance from Sidhu.

Sidhu, who secured an Olympic quota by winning the gold at the Asia Olympic Qualifiers in January, had recorded a score of 199.4 in the finals.

(With inputs from IANS and PTI.)