Rich gold harvest by Indian boxers

The penultimate day witnessed more scrappy bouts than good ones. With more Indians pitted against one another, the interest was limited to which of the Indian would emerge the winner.

In fact, the day started on a promising note with Amardeep Gurung from Shillong outclassing his Bangladesh opponent in the sub-junior class. The eighth class Army Boys Company student, with a sub-junior national gold under his belt, started with a flurry of combinations to force the referee stop the contest in the second round. The other two finals turned out to be one-sided.

As for the juniors’ bouts, Akhil Kumar in cork category and Parveen Kumar in light weight class had to endure themselves for quite a long period to outwit their opponents with narrow margins. Akil won 17-13 while Parveen Kumar managed a 15-13 verdict.

The bout in the middle weight category between Indian Jeevan Fernandes and Dorji of Bhutan, who had a knock-out score against a Sri Lankan earlier, failed to elicit the kind of interest one had anticipated before its start. For, it turned out to be the shortest bout of the tournament with the Bhutanese retiring within seconds of the start.

Fernandes charged at the Bhutanese at the bell and connected three right hooks to his upper rib-cage before sending one left hook to the head. Even as the wobbling Bhutanese took the standing count in the first 30 seconds, he throw his arms up shaking his head in disbelief.

Durjai Shastri of India Yellow struggled before outpointing Hayat Singh of India (Pink) to win the gold at 24-21. Durjai, despite being taller than his opponent, was slow to begin while connecting his left-right. The combination failed him so much in the initial stages that he allowed Hayat to connect some right hooks to pick valuable points.

But from the second round onwards Durjai picked up the threads and landed some lighting blows to Hayat’s body and threw a few punches to the face to swell his points. But he allowed Hayat to come back in the last round where the Indian Pink pugilist managed to land a few straights to narrow the gap. However, he had allowed Durjai several points in the earlier rounds that the last-gasp punches were of no avail.

The day also saw a Mauritian, a Sri Lankan and an Ukranian picking gold with some excellent combinations. But it was Sri Lankan Prasanna, who did the damage to Indian Niteya Singh’s reputation in welter category. The Lankan air force employee, with quick foot movements and lighting power-packed punches started with some body blows to the Indians even as he connected few lefts to shatter the Indian’s morale.

Dropping guard the Lankan invited the Indian to go for the blows but Niteya found it difficult to connect. But the Lankan was all over with his powerful blows and seemingly tired in the last round let the Indian come back to pick some quick points. But that was of no avail as the Lankan had logged more points to ensure him victory.

Earlier, A. Haridas Singh of Services did not have to sweat it out as his Indian opponent Sanjit Singh was declared medically unfit as the latter had received a deep cut on his right eye.