What’s the story?
The Indian women’s boxing team secured a historic third place, winning 1 gold, 4 silver, and 1 bronze at the 6th Nation's Cup women's tournament in Serbia. Kazakhstan emerged winners followed by Russia in the second.
This was the first tournament in which the women boxers featured under the apprenticeship of former boxing coach Gurbax Singh Sandhu. Sandhu, who was the coach of the Indian men boxing team since 1993, played a major role in Vijender Singh winning the bronze medal at the 2008 Olympics.
Gurbax Singh on his success in his maiden assignment as the national women's boxing coach, told PTI, "I am very happy with how the girls have performed in this tournament. We came here with just about 25 days of training and the girls have done us proud."
In case you didn’t know...
The 6th Nation’s Cup which started on January 10, was being held in Vrbas, Serbia. A total of 18 countries participated in the tournament. All the bouts were fought under the new International Boxing Association (AIBA) technical rules, where boxers had to fight in three rounds lasting three minutes each.
The championship is considered as a preparatory tournament for the AIBA Women’s World Championships, which will be held in Almaty, Kazakhstan in May this year.
The heart of the matter
Competing in her maiden international tournament, Haryana-girl Neeraj struck gold in the 51kg category. The reigning national champion defeated Kazakhstan's Jaina Shekerbekova to win the only gold for the country.
Other Indian boxers, Sarjubala Devi (in 48kg), Priyanka Chaudhary (in 60kg), Pooja (in 69kg) and Seema Poonia (in +81kg), had to settle for silver medals after losing their respective summit clash.
Former World Champion silver medallist Sarjubala Devi went down 3-2 to Russia's Yulia Chumgalakova in an equally contested match. On the other hand, Priyanka lost to Kazakhstan's Rimma Volosenko while Pooja ended up losing to Valentina Khalzovato to clinch a silver for the country.
Seema, who reached the finals without having to fight a single bout since her category featured only three boxers, also lost to Kazakhstan’s Lyazzat Kungenbayeva.
Asian Games bronze medallist Kavita Goyat won the only bronze, after losing her semifinal contest owing to a knee injury.
What’s next?
Finishing third in a major tournament would give the Indian eve’s a much-needed morale boost. With the world championships just a few months away, the Indian women boxing team would be preparing in full swing as set their eyes on gold, and gaining confidence from their current performance.
Sportskeeda’s take
With Sarita Devi turning professional, this year definitely promises to be an interesting year for Indian women boxing and we, here at Sportskeeda, wish that more pugilists receive the right kind of training and exposure to excel in the sport.
