Bangladesh had something to cheer about on the penultimate day of the 12th South Asian Games as they bagged three silver and four bronze medals in Guwahati yesterday.

All the three silver medals came from the women's events of handball, kabaddi and shooting while the four bronze medals came from taekwondo, men's football and men's handball. Out of the two bronze medals in taekwondo, Tahamida Tabassum won in 52kg category while Habibur Rahman grabbed bronze in 81kg category.

With yesterday's feat, Bangladesh raised their medals tally to four gold, 15 silver and 50 bronze medals.

HANDBALL

Bangladesh women's handball team had to be content with a silver medal after suffering a massive 25-45 goal defeat to India in Sonapur, some 20kms from the Guwahati town.

The Bangladeshi girls were far behind the Indians in every aspect -- technique, tactic, fitness, speed, movement. With full-house crowd supporting the home side from gallery, the Indian left-hand oriented players were almost unstoppable in both planned attack and counter attacks while Bangladesh goalkeeper Shila Roy, who was flown in to India yesterday after the funeral of her mother, looked shaky under the post and could hardly stop the opponent players.

"India were much ahead of us technically and tactically. The senior team have played its first international tournament after eight years while the Indian team played at least 25 international matches in last two years,” coach Didar Hossain said after the match.

In men's event, Bangladesh handed a 37-25 goal defeat to Nepal to retain the bronze medal they won in the 2010 SA Games in Dhaka.

KABADDI 

Like the women's handball team, the women's kabaddi team also never appeared to pose a threat for India, who won the gold medal match with a 36-12 points win.

The Bangladeshi girls could manage only 12 points from 'the out' while Indian girls earned 13 bonus points out of 36 as well as two points from lona.

“What you have seen in the match is our standard. Even though we had a target of giving India a run for the money, we could not do so due to playing the final less than 24 hours after the semifinal,” said captain Shahnaj Parvin Maleka.

Explaining the strength of Indian team, Maleka said, “If you shake hands with them, you can realise how hard their hands are. They do gym regularly while we can't even play domestic matches regularly.”

SHOOTING

After failure in the men's 10m air pistol team event, the women's team ensured a bronze medal as Ardina Ferdous, Armin Asha and Turin Dewan jointly scored a total of 1103 points, some 30 points less than the India team, who confirmed gold medal.

Asha and Ardina also qualified for the individual 10m air pistol event but they could not finish among the top three as Asha finished fourth while Ardina had to quit the competition due to a glitz of her pistol.

FOOTBALL

Bangladesh footballers found some consolation in a bronze medal they won after beating Maldives 5-4 in tiebreaker following a 2-2 stalemate in regulation time.

Playing without influential midfielder Jamal Bhuiyan and without the coach Ganzalo Sanchez Moreno at the dug-out, Bangladesh went ahead in the ninth minute when Nabib Newaj Jibon converted a penalty kick and raised tally to three goals from four matches. However, Bangladesh threw away the lead in the 38th minute, thanks to goalkeeper Rasel Mahmud Liton's failure to read a 35-yard free-kick from Ali Fasir.

Maldives went ahead with the second strike from Fasir in the 65th minute before Sohel Rana levelled the margin four minutes later.

The match rolled into shootout after the extra time failed to find a winner. Atiqur Rahman Fahad, Mashuk Mia Jonny, Rubel Mia, Yeasin Khan and Raihan Hasan duly converted their shots while Essa Ismail missed the fifth attempt for Maldives, handing Bangladesh the bronze medal.

This is the second bronze medal for Bangladesh men's team in SA GAmes football alongside three silver and two gold medals they won previously.

Meanwhile, the South Asian Olympic Committee yesterday decided that the 13th edition of the SA Games will be held in Nepal in 2018.