Asian boxing: Sarita and Sonia enter the last four

November 05, 2017 09:32 pm | Updated 09:32 pm IST - Ho Chi Minh City

Sarita Devi.

Sarita Devi.

L. Sarita Devi (64kg) and World championships silver-medallist Sonia Lather (57kg) advanced to the semifinals and assured themselves of medals at the Asian women’s boxing championships here on Sunday. However, it was curtains for Neeraj (51kg) in the quarterfinals.

Sarita defeated Maftunakhon Melieva of Uzbekistan, while Sonia edged past Kazakhstan’s Nazym Ichshanova in the quarterfinals. Nation’s Cup gold-medallist Neeraj went down in a unanimous verdict to Chinese Taipei’s Chol Mi Pang.

Sarita took full advantage of her opponent’s reluctance to attack and connected some lusty right hooks to take the upper-hand early.

At the very beginning of the second round, Melieva faced a standing eight count after a flurry of combination punches from the Indian left her dazed.

Melieva gave a better account of herself in the final three minutes but Sarita displayed some fine ring craft to dodge the attacks.

Sonia, on the other hand, had to stave off a stiff challenge from Kazakhstan’s Nazym Ichshanova in a split verdict to enter the last-four stage, assuring herself of her second medal at the event. She is a former silver medallist at the continental meet.

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.