What’s the story
India is assured of five medals at the sixth Nation's Cup as five of its women pugilists made it to the semifinals of the season-opening tournament. While four of the boxers will play in the semifinals, Seema Punia, who represents the country in the +81kg category received a bye and is assured of at least a silver.
This is the first tourney in which the women boxers are featuring in under the apprenticeship of former men’s boxing coach Gurbax Singh Sandhu. Sandhu, who was coaching the Indian men boxers since 1993, played a huge part in Vijender Singh’s bronze medal run in the 2008 Summer Games.
In case you didn’t know...
The sixth Nation’s cup started on January 10 and is being held in Vrbas, Serbia. 18 countries are participating in the tournament and the bouts are being fought under the new International Boxing Association (AIBA) technical rules, where boxers have to fight in three rounds of three minutes each.
The event is considered as a preparatory tourney for the AIBA Women’s World Championships, which will be held in Almaty, Kazakhstan in May this year.
Also Read: Interview with boxer Sarjubala Devi: Taking over from Mary Kom will be exciting and challenging
Heart of the matter
The five pugilists who have assured a medal for the country are Sarjubala Devi (48kg), Priyanka Chaudhry (60kg), Pooja (69kg), Kavita Goyat (75kg) and Seema Punia (+81kg). While the first four boxers will have to take to the ring in the semifinals to book a place in the final, Punia got a bye for the finals as her category only has three boxers in the fray.
Moreover, while this will be Pooja’s first bout in the tournament courtesy of a bye, Sarjubala Devi, Priyanka Chaudhry and Kavita Goyat, who is a former Asian Games bronze-medallist, had to win a bout each to earn the honours.
While Sarjubala overpowered Serbia’s own Katarina Djurovic in the preliminary rounds, Priyanka defeated Lithuania's Vaida Masiokaite and Kavita got the better of Russia's Olga Lapekha.
However, five of India’s boxers failed to make it to the medal rounds, namely, Saweety Boora (81kg), Shiksha (54kg), Sonia (57kg), Simranjeet Kaur (64kg) and Pooja (69kg).
What’s next?
One of the Indian pugilists can still make it to the semifinals as Neeraja, who plays in the 51kg category will be facing Greece's Aik Koutsogeorgopoulou in the quarterfinals. While the semifinals are scheduled for January 14, the finals will take place the next day on 15th.
Sportskeeda’s take
With Sarita Devi turning professional, 2017 definitely promises to be an interesting year for Indian women boxing and we, here at Sportskeeda, hope for a lot more from our boxers.
