New Delhi: Fans at the Karni Singh shooting range, on Tuesday, were a delighted lot as local favourite Jitu Rai recovered to bag the bronze medal in the men's 10m air pistol in the World Cup shooting meet.

Jitu finished behind former World champion Tomoyuki Matsuda of Japan and reigning Olympic Champion Xuan Vinh Hoang of Vietnam, who won the gold and the silver, respectively.

Jitu, who, in the last three years had won a medal in every global and continental meet barring the Rio Olympics, qualified for the eight-man final in sixth place, shooting a score of 577 in the allotted 60 shots.

In the final, he had a poor start, shooting a couple of 9s and an 8.8 in the first five shot series. He was almost set to be eliminated at one point of time, but a brilliant fight back saw him gain places rapidly towards the end with five scores of 10s or high 10s between the 15th and the 20th shots.

Backed by the home crowd, Jitu was in the second place by the end of the 21st shot, but an 8.6 in his 22nd shot reduced him to the bronze medal position. Tomoyuki shot 240.1 in the final, Xuan Vinh Hoang shot 236.6 and Jitu ended with a score of 216.7.

"The poor start was a blessing in disguise as that took away all the pressure of performing at home and I was able to fully focus on perfect execution. I am very happy with this medal as it came in front of my own people. I dedicate this medal to Indian army, because of whom I am here today," said Jitu.

"I don't think much about the scoreboard as that can affect my mind. When I was down, I was only thinking about the job at hand and what I needed to do," added Jitu.