NEW DELHI: A pat on the back by none other than International Boxing Association president Ching Kuo Wu came as a shot in the arm as five Indian boxers geared up for the Asian Olympic Qualifiers semifinals in Astana, Kazakhstan on Wednesday.
Of the five in fray, only Vijender Singh (75kg) is assured of a London berth so far as his category has four slots on offer. The 26-year-old Olympic and World Championship bronze medallist will be appearing in his third Olympics — a first for an Indian boxer.
Shiva Thapa (56kg) and Sumit Sangwan (81kg) need to win their respective semifinals to be assured of a ticket to London, while Manpreet Singh (91kg) and Paramjeet Samota (+91kg) have to go all the way and clinch a gold to make it to the Olympics.
Shiva and Sumit can qualify for London even if they don’t win tomorrow provided their respective opponents go on to clinch gold medals as their categories have three slots each up for grabs.
Shiva will face Japan’s Satoshi Simizu, Manpreet will fight it out with Iran’s Ali Mazaheri, while Sumit will be up against Jordan’s Ihab Almatdault in the semifinals.
Samota will be competing against Syria’s Soumar Ghosoun in his first bout of the event as he got a bye in the semis, while Vijender will take on Asian and Youth Olympics bronze medallist Nursahat Pazziyev.
As they geared up for the big battle, the Indian contingent’s performance drew the attention of Wu, who is in Astana, and he put in a word of praise for the country’s pugilists.
Wu has reason to praise as the Indians have put up a tremendous performance so far. Of the six who came to the event, five are in the semifinals as only Suranjoy Singh (52kg) lost in the preliminaries.
The 18-year-old Shiva beat a former Olympic silver-medallist — Thailand’s Worapoj Petchkoom — to make it to the semifinals, while the 19-year-old Sumit, playing his first senior international event, has also performed exceptionally well.
But there a tinge of disappointment as well at Suranjoy’s early exit as the Commonwealth Games gold-medallist was considered a strong contender for Olympic qualification. Four Indian boxers — L Devendro Singh (49kg), Jai Bhagwan (60kg), Manoj Kumar (64kg) and Vikas Krishan (69kg) — had already booked their berths in the Olympics. (PTI)
