Chotelal Yadav of Services gave his team a winning start against arch rival Railways when he outpointed K. Manikandan in the bantamweight (56 kg) first round bout on the opening day of the Sahara 59th senior National boxing championship for men at the Lal Bahadur stadium here on Tuesday.
With both boxers evenly matched the contest turned out to be an interesting one. In the first round Chotelal tried to come in close while Manikandan preferred to stay at a distance and score with his accurate straight lefts.
Manikandan’s right crosses also had a telling effect on the Services boxer but towards the end of the round Chotelal’s tactics paid off to some extent and he was able to garner some points.
Furious exchange
The second round saw a furious exchange of punches from both boxers and again it was only towards the end of the round that Chtoelal’s superior stamina which enabled him gain an advantage.
The third round was keenly contested as Manikandan tried to counter Chotelal’s stamina and power with his speed and accuracy. But when the bout ended Chotelal emerged a comfortable winner at 16-6.
But Railways had better luck in flyweight class where Sunil chalked up an easy 23-6 win over Sanjay Mishra of MP. Host Andhra had a bad day as one of its main hopes Trivikram Dev lost to Gajendra of MP in super heavyweight class. The referee had to stop the contest in the second round as Trivikram was outclassed.
Earlier, the organisers felicitated Beijing Olympics bronze medallist Vijender Singh, chief national coach G. S. Sandhu, Dronacharya winner I. Venkateshwara Rao and former national coach E. Chiranjeevi.
The results:
Light flyweight (49 kgs): Lal Chand Dhaw (WB) bt Prashant K.M. (Ker) 18-3.
Flyweight (52 kgs): Sunil (RSPB) bt Sanjay Mishra (MP) 24-4.
Bantamweight (56 kgs): Ashish (UP) bt Leo John (Ker) RSC second round; Amit Bisht (Raj) bt Jitender (SPSB) 15-10; Kulwinder Singh (Pun) bt Aman (SPSB) 15-10; Kamal Singh (Tri) bt Pradeep (Bih) retd first round; Chotelal Yadav (SSCB) bt K. Manikandan (RSPB) 16-6; Ajay Kumar (Har) bt Sunny (Ori) 15-12; V.D. Rao (Kar) bt Shobnath (Guj) RSC first round; Pranit Kumbhar (Mah) bt Murugen (And) RSC first round; Yudhveer (MP) bt Vikas (Del) 18-14; Anubhav (Utk) bt Vinoth Kumar (TN) RSC second round.
Light welterweight (64 kgs): Pramod (Tri) bt Rohit (Ori) 17-7.
Middlewight (75 kgs): Jaideep (SSCB) bt D. S. Sundar (And) RSC first round.
Super heavyweight (plus 91 kgs): Manjeet Singh (Pun) bt Gurpreet Singh (Del) 11-7; Gajendra (MP) bt Trivikram Dev (AP) RSC second round.
