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What's the story?
Ashish Kumar (75 Kg), Manish Kaushik (63 Kg) and Sachin Kumar (81 Kg) continued India's dominating run at the Asia-Oceania Olympic Boxing Qualifiers by sailing through to the men's quarterfinals in their respective weight categories. All 3 of them are now just one win away from qualifying for the Tokyo Olympic Games 2020.
In case you didn't know
The Asia & Oceania zone Olympic Qualification Tournament for Boxing is being held at the Prince Hamzah Hall in Amman, Jordan from 3rd to 11th March. The qualifiers are being held across 13 weight categories (8 for men and 5 for women).
The Indian boxers are participating in the qualifiers in each of the 13 weight categories with London Olympic bronze medalist and 6-time World Champion Mary Kom and World Championship silver medalist Amit Panghal leading the pack.
The 63 kg weight category has 6 Olympic slots while the 75 kg and 81 kg weight categories have 5 Olympic slots up for grabs in these qualifiers.
This was the first bout for Manish Kaushik (63 kg) and Sachin Kumar (81 kg) in the tournament while Ashish Kumar (75 kg) had earlier come through his Round of 32 encounter with a unanimous 5-0 verdict against Kan Chia-Wei of Chinese Taipei.
Heart of the matter
India continued its perfect start to the Asia-Oceania Olympic Boxing Qualifiers with Ashish Kumar, Manish Kaushik and Sachin Kumar winning their pre-quarterfinal bouts in the men's 75 kg, 63 kg and 81 kg weight categories respectively. Having made it through to the quarterfinals, they are just a win away from qualifying for the Tokyo Olympics 2020.
Ashish, the first Indian boxer to take the ring, defeated fourth-seeded Omurbek Bekzhigit Uulu of Kyrgyzstan in the men's 75 kg weight category with a unanimous 5-0 verdict in his favour.
Ashish started aggressively and got a unanimous 5-0 verdict in the 1st round with all the judges scoring the round 10-9 in the Indian's favour.
Uulu came back strong in the 2nd round and took the fight to the Indian. Ashish withstood the attack bravely and got a split 3-2 verdict in his favour in the closely-fought round with 3 judges scoring the round 10-9 in favour of the Indian and the other 2 judges scoring the round 10-9 in favour of the Kyrgyz boxer.
Ashish was dominant again in the 3rd round and ended the bout as a unanimous 5-0 victor with the final judges score reading 30-27, 30-27, 30-27, 29-28 and 29-28 in his favour.
Manish Kumar followed in Ashish's footsteps, defeating Lai Chu-En of Chinese Taipei with a unanimous 5-0 verdict in his favour in the men's 63 kg weight category.
It was an action packed opening round with both boxers on the aggressive but it was Manish who came up with the telling blows to get a split 4-1 verdict with 4 judges scoring the round 10-9 in his favour and 1 judge scoring the round 10-9 in favour of his opponent.
The 2nd round also followed a similar script with the Indian bagging a split 4-1 verdict, four judges scoring the round 10-9 in his favour and one judge scoring the round 10-9 in favour of his opponent.
Manish, a bronze medalist at the World Championships, was the dominant boxer in the final round and got a unanimous verdict in his favour with the final judges score replicating the scores from Ashish's bout, 3 judges scoring the bout 30-27 and the other 2 judges scoring it 29-28.
Sachin Kumar, the last Indian to take the ring, virtually toyed with his opponent Dee Ioapa of Samoa to clinch a unanimous 5-0 decision in his favour in the 81 kg weight category.
It was a one-sided encounter with all the judges scoring the bout 10-9 in the Indian's favour in all the 3 rounds with each of the judges' final scorecard reading 30-27.
What's next?
Ashish will be facing Maikhel Muskita of Indonesia in the 75 kg quarter final encounter. Manish will be up against the third-seeded Chinzorig Baatarsukh of Mongolia while Sachin will fight it out against Chen Daixang in their quarterfinal encounters.
A win in these quarterfinal encounters would earn them an entry into the semi-finals and guarantee a ticket to the Tokyo Olympics 2020.
