Paris Olympics 2024 Day 1 Highlights: Indian men's hockey team beats NZ 3-2 in their opening match; Manu Bhaker in women's 10m air pistol final

Paris Olympics 2024 Day 1 Live: Manu Bhaker made a statement of intent by storming into the 10m air pistol final before medal favourites in badminton and the men's hockey team got off to triumphant starts on a reasonably good opening day for India at the Olympic Games on Saturday.

The Harmanpreet Singh-led hockey team outwitted New Zealand 3-2, rallying in a see-saw game that was decided just one minute before the hooter went off. For India, Mandeep Singh, Vivek Sagar Prasad and Harmanpreet did the scoring. India will play Argentina in their next Pool B match on Monday.

In the badminton competition being held at the Porte de La Chapelle Arena in Paris, the celebrated men's doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty recorded an easy straight-game victory in their opening group stage men's doubles match after Lakshya Sen got his maiden Olympic campaign underway on a winning note.

At the South Paris Arena, paddler Harmeet Desai also dazzled on debut. He added some more sparkle to India's performance by progressing to the men's singles second round with a convincing 4-0 victory over Jordan's Zaid Abo Yaman.

India's lone rower at Games, Balraj Panwar moved to the repechage after finishing fourth in heat 1 of the men's singles scull competition.

Bhaker, who was in control for the major part of the one hour 15 minute session, will have to maintain the same composure in the all-important final slated for Sunday.

India has not won an Olympic medal in shooting since 2012 and Bhaker is well placed to end that lean run.

Standing at a distance, Bhaker's personal coach Jaspal Rana could not stop his tears before saying that the job was only half done.

"What happened today doesn't matter anymore. Tomorrow is when it counts. We start afresh," he told PTI before pointing out the heat factor at the range with the air conditioning not being the most effective.

"She needed to take time and drink a lot of water as it was hot," Rana added.

Indian boxer Preeti Pawar defeated Vietnam's Vo Thi Kim Anh in women's 54kg category first round bout to enter the pre-quarterfinals at the Paris Olympics on Saturday. Asian Games bronze medallist Preeti, competing in her debut Olympic Games, opened the proceedings for India and she won 5-0 on points.