After the defeats of Vikas, Sumit and Manoj in early rounds and Shiva Thapa’s withdrawal from the World Championship due to illness, Gaurav Bidhuri became a new hero of Indian Boxing. The 24-year-old Boxer defeated Bilel Mhamdi (Tunisia) by the split decision of 3-0 in the Men’s 56kg QF and assured a medal for India.
As it unfolded, it was a neck to neck fight between Bidhuri and Mhamdi, and Gaurav started his aggressive and offensive pattern since the start and as a result of this, the Tunisian got injured in the opening round with a deep cut on his forehead. Mhamdi, though, didn’t give up easily and despite the dangerous cut he tried to give some competition to Gaurav.
By reaching in Semifinals, Gaurav became the 4th Indian after Vijender Singh (2009), Vikas Krishan (2011), Shiva Thapa (2015) to get assured off a World Championship medal and 2nd Indian after Vikas to do this in his debut World Championship.
Incidentally, Gaurav was not even qualified for this championship, he had lost in the box-offs for quota places during the Asian Championships and got a lucky entry after Bhutan declined a slot offered to them by Asian Boxing Confederation.
In semi-finals, Gaurav will face Duke Ragan (USA) who has defeated 2nd seeded Zhang Jiawei (China) in the other Quarterfinal.
This will be a memorable championship for Gaurav and he has chances to exhibit the best performance by any Indian boxer by reaching the finals.