Asian Boxing: Minakshi, Jaismine to fight for gold; Vishvanath, Sachin also move to finals

ULAANBAATAR: Reigning world champions Jaismine Lamboria and Meenakshi Hooda progressed to the finals along with two others at the Asian Boxing Championships here on Tuesday, taking India's total finalists to eight.

Vishvanath Suresh (50kg) and Sachin Siwach (60kg) also registered impressive semifinal wins, while Akash (75kg), Lokesh (85kg), Narender Berwal (90+kg) and Harsh Choudhary (90kg) signed off with bronze medals.

India will thus have eight boxers -- six women and two men fighting in the final.

In the women's 48kg semifinal, Meenakshi secured a confident 4-1 win over Thailand's Thipsatcha Yodwaree to book her place in the gold medal bout, where she will face local favourite Nomundari Enkh-Amgalan.

Jaismine joined her in the finals after edging past Uzbekistan's Nigina Uktamova 3-2 in a hard-fought 57kg semifinal. The 2022 Commonwealth Games bronze medallist will take on Thailand's Punrawee Ruenros in the title clash.

In the men's section, Vishvanath, who had stunned reigning world champion and world No. 1 Sanzhar Tashkenbay of Kazakhstan in the previous round, continued his fine run with a dominant 5-0 victory over Jordan's Huthaifa Eshish to advance to the final.

World Cup medallist Sachin (60kg) also impressed, posting a solid 4-1 win over Thailand’s Sakda Ruamtham in his semifinal.

Akash, however, lost 1-4 to Uzbekistan's Javokhir Abdurakhimov while Lokesh went down 0-5 against Jasurbek Yuldoshev of Uzbekistan.

Just fell short

Asian Games bronze medallist Narender suffered a 1-4 defeat to China's Bayikewuzi Danabieke with the bout being stopped in the first round due to a cut.

Harsh Choudhary also went down by a similar 1-4 margin to Tajikistan's Parviz Karimov.

In other key finals featuring Indian boxers, Preeti (54kg) will go up against Chinese Taipei's Huang Hsiao-wen, while Priya (60kg) faces North Korea's Un Gyong Won. Arundhati Choudhary (70kg) is set to meet Kazakhstan's Bakyt Seidish in her gold medal bout.