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India boxer Pooja Rani successfully defended her title after outpunching in-form Mavluda Movlonova to clinch her second successive gold at the ASBC Asian Boxing Championships as Indian women ended its campaign with one gold, three silver and six bronze medals in Dubai on Sunday.
Seasoned campaigner Mary Kom (51kg), Lalbuatsaihi (64kg) and Anupama (+81kg) claimed silver medals after suffering narrow defeats in their respective finals. While Simranjit Kaur (60kg), Lovlina Borgohain (69kg), Jaismine (57kg), Sakshi Chaudhary (54kg), Monika (48kg) and Saweety (81kg) are among the Indian women pugilists who secured bronze with semi-final finish.
The Olympics-bound pugilist Pooja Rani (75kg) was up against a strong Uzbekistan boxer, who came into the match beating London Olympics medallist Marina Volnova in the last-4 stage. Pooja showed great sharpness and tactical brilliance and put pressure on the opponent with timely punches. She continued her relentless attack and left no chance for Uzbek boxer to fight back before completing a comprehensive 5-0 victory and winning her second successive gold medal at the Asian Championships. It is also Pooja’s fourth medal at the championships after gold in 2019, silver in 2012 and a bronze in 2015.
Earlier Mary Kom, Lalbuatsaihi finished their campaigns with silver medals after going down fighting in their respective semi-finals. While Mary Kom lost to the two-time world champion Nazym Kyzaibay by split 2-3, Lalbuatsaihi (64kg) also gave her all in another close-fought gold medal but couldn’t manage to get past Milana Safronova of Kazakhstan and suffered a 2-3 defeat to win silver medal in her maiden outing at the Championships.
While in the 51kg high-octane summit clash, Mary Kom went down to her Kazakh opponent in a 3-2 split decision, Lalbuatsaihi lost 2-3 as well but after giving her Kazakh rival Milana Safronova a fight to remember.
Lalbuatsaihi came into the Indian team as a late replacement for the seasoned Pwilao Basumatary, whose passport had expired. The Mizo boxer exhausted her rival with her counter-attacks but lost momentum in the final round to end second best.
Anupama was the last to take the ring against former world champion Lazzat Kungeibayeva of Kazakhstan. She managed to hold her own in a bout marred by excessive holding and clinching, but it was Kungeibayeva, who connected better for a 3-2 win.
The on-going prestigious Championships, which is jointly hosted by the Boxing Federation of India (BFI) and UAE Boxing Federation, the 19-member Indian contingent claimed their best-ever show by securing record 15 medals while surpassing their previous highest of 13 medals (2 gold, 4 silver and 7 bronze) from the 2019 edition in Bangkok.
(With PTI Inputs)
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