TOP SEEDS THROUGH AT OLYMPIC BOXING QUALIFIERS
Mar 07, 2020
A trio of tournament top seeds all advanced to the quarter-finals of the Asian/Oceanian Road to Tokyo 2020 Boxing qualifying event in Amman after Saturday’s morning session, but World No. 1 Amit Panghal was close to suffering a big upset.
The Indian world silver medallist and Asian Champion weathered a battering in his final round against Mongolia’s Enkhmandakh Kharkuu to edge a split decision and a last eight bout with Carlo Paalam, who beat Afghanistan’s Ramish Rahmani, on Monday morning.
“I have fought him twice before and it was one win each, so we knew how he boxed and stuck to the plan we made,” said Panghal, the Flyweight 51kg top seed.
China’s 2016 Olympic bronze medallist, Jianguan Hu, won on the referee’s verdict after a clash of heads brought his fight with Chinese Taipei’s Po-Wei Tu to an early end in the third round due a cut over the latter’s left eye.
Hu will next fight World bronze medallist, Saken Bibossinov, in the last eight after the Kazakh south-paw beat Azat Usenaliev, of Kyrgyzstan, with a unanimous judges’ decision.
It was a tough passage through too for Featherweight 57kg top seed Mirazizbek Mirzakhalilov, of Uzbekistan, who worked hard for his split decision win against India’s Gaurav Solanki.
His next opponent will be Sing Yu Tso, of Hong Kong, who survived a late barrage from Tajikistan’s Bakhtovar Sagizov to win a split decision.
World No. 14 and tournament fourth seed, Jamie Chang, of Papua New Guinea, was stopped in the second round by confident Iranian teenager, Daniyal Shahbakhsh, 19, who could be one of the tournament’s surprise packages. His quarter-final opponent will be Kazakhstan’s former Asian Youth Champion, Serik Temirzhanov, who dominated his fight with Iraq’s Jaafar Al-Subani.
Elsewhere, World Champion and women’s 51kg top seed Hsiao-Wen Huang cruised through to the quarter-finals with a win over World bronze medallist Kirsty Harris, of Australia.
Both boxers have dropped down in weight in their bids to reach Tokyo this summer, but it was the Chinese Taipei fighter who came through with a unanimous decision.
“I dropped down in weight because I feel I have more energy at 51kg,” said Huang. “I was worried when I knew who I was fighting because she (Kirsty) is a very good opponent but I showed that my decision to come down a weight was the right one.”
Huang will next fight five-time Uzbekistan champion, Tursunoy Rakhimova, who beat South Korea’s Joohyung Jung.
World bronze medallist and tournament fourth seed, Tsukimi Namiki, beat Mongolia’s Altantsetseg Lutsaikhan, and Thailand’s Jutamas Jitpong overcame Kazakhstan’s Angelina Lukas to meet in the next round on Monday evening.