Services Sports Control Board boxers dominate sixth elite men’s national boxing championship

The Services Sports Control Board (SSCB) boxers fought a pitched battle in the sixth elite men’s national boxing championship in Hisar to retain the overall title.

While the SSCB team won six golds, one silver and three bronze medals on Friday, the Railway Sports Promotion Board (RSPB) trailed at second place with two gold, three silver and two bronze medals.

Punjab boxers finished strongly in third place with one gold, two silver and six bronze medals. Hosts Haryana won two gold medals through Abhimanyu Loura (80kg) and Naveen (92kg).

Assam’s Shiva Thapa, the most experienced boxer in the field, lived up to his reputation to win the 63.5kg title. The six-time Asian championship medallist Thapa denied Ankit Narwal, the 2021 World Youth Bronze medallist of the RSPB, the opportunity to take control of the contest and eventually won the gold medal by unanimous decision.

The RSPB team suffered a setback in the 57kg final as Sachin, the 2016 world youth champion, made Mohammed Hussamuddin of the SSCB work hard in the ring, but wasn’t able to completely run him down, which eventually proved costly. Hussamuddin dug into his reserve to post a 4-1 win over Sachin to add a gold medal to the SSCB kitty.

Bishwamitra Chongtham (51kg), Sachin (54kg), Akash (67kg) and Sumit (75kg) were other gold medal winners for the SSCB team.

RSPB had something to cheer about as Govind Sahani won 48kg gold, while 2021 Asian championship bronze medallist Varinder Singh added the team's second gold by winning the 60kg title.

Sahani beat Keisham Singh of Manipur 5-0, while Varinder outplayed Vijay Kumar of Punjab by an identical margin.

Abhimanyu Loura of Haryana stunned Tokyo Olympian Ashish Kumar of Himachal Pradesh in the quarters. Loura continued to exhibit his class in the final and outclassed Sahil from Chandigarh 4-1 to earn Haryana’s first gold medal and also won the most promising boxer award of the tournament.

Naveen Kumar upset Sanjeet, the 2021 Asian champion, to win 92kg gold with a scoreline of 4-1. Punjab’s Kartik, who won 86kg gold, was awarded the best boxer title at the sixth elite men’s national boxing championship.

Zoram Muana of Mizoram won the best challenger award of the week-long national competition.