Hope floats

JAKARTA—Wushu’s Divine Wally lost in the semifinals of the women’s 52-kilogram sanda event Wednesday and settled for the bronze, the country’s fourth in the 18th Asian Games, which came a day after the Philippines broke through in the continental showcase courtesy of lifter Hidilyn Diaz.

In a match late in Day 4, Wally, the 2015 world champion, lost, 2-1, to Iran’s Elaheh Mansoryan Samiroumi at Jakarta International Expo for the Philippines’ fifth medal—counting the other three bronzes won by the men’s and women’s poomsae trios and Agatha Wong, another wushu bet.

Wally made the semifinals after posting a 7-2 win over hometown bet Petriwi Selviah earlier in the day, only to fall in a match where she was expected to dominate her Iranian foe.

Ironically, a win would have given the Philippines zero medals for the day, but would have put Wally in contention for a gold.

Instead, hope for a second gold on Thursday will be pinned on 4-foot-11 bundle of energy Carlos Yulo, who resumes his gold quest in the men’s floor exercise.

The Philippines’ lone gold came from Diaz, who ruled the women’s 53-kilogram snatch and clean and jerk events of weightlifting.

Yulo takes a stab at gold No. 2 and a historic first artistic gymnastics gold in the country’s long participation in this continental showcase.

The 18-year-old Yulo, who has been training in Japan for the last three years preparing for tournaments of this magnitude, topped the eight-man field that made it to the medal round of his pet floor exercise and will start seeing action at 4 p.m. (5 p.m. in Manila).

Yulo, the silver medalist in the floor exercise early this year in the World Cup in Doha, scored 14.500 in classification, with Chinese Taipei’s Chia- Hong Tang placing second at 14.450 and Japan’s Kakeru Tanegawa third at 14.400.

He finished seventh in a 24-man field in the individual all-around with a score of 80.750, six points behind champion Lin Chaopan of China.

Yulo will also compete in the vault finals.

Meanwhile, the Blu Girls advanced to the page system playoff of softball after routing host Indonesia, 4-0, under scorching heat at Gelano Bung Karno field to raise their record to 4-1, tied for second with China behind undefeated Japan.

They were to play Chinese Taipei at 8 p.m. Wednesday for a win that would assure them of a bronze medal at the very least and a chance to play for the gold.

Royevel Palma hurled a no-hitter in three innings relieving Mary Ann Antolihao as the Blu Girls regained sharp form a night after being downed by the tournament-leading Japanese, 1-11.

The bowling trio of Liza del Rosario, Lara Posadas and Alexis Sy finished way out of the medal fight as the Malaysian team of Hamidi Badrul, Rahman Siti Adbul and Mei Lan Cheah took the gold.