Sofia: India’s young women made the country proud at the ‘Balkan’ International Boxing Championship in Bulgaria’s capital city of Sofia as they ended up clinching eight medals in total, of which four are gold, to make the country the most successful one in the competition.
The tournament, which was held over a week was mainly for preparing the Indian women for the AIBA Women’s Youth World Boxing which is scheduled to be held from November 19-26 in Guwahati. India’s top 10 youth women boxers competed against 49 other participants from 13 different countries in the competition.
Sweden, Poland, Kosovo, Canada, Albania, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Russia, England, Italy, Hungary, India and hosts Bulgaria participated in the tournament.
Ajay Singh, the president of the Boxing Federation of India (BFI) was a happy man as he heaped praise on the participants and said that they are headed in the right direction with the AIBA Women’s Youth World Boxing Championship in mind.
“I want to congratulate the Indian contingent for yet another good show. This shows that we are on the right track for the AIBA Women’s Youth World Boxing Championship that we are hosting next month,” he said.
Netu clinched the first gold medal for India in the 48 kg category as she defeated Emi-Mari of Bulgaria 5-0 while Shashi won the second gold in the 57 kg category as she outplayed Italy’s Giordana Sorrentino.
Sakshi bagged India’s third gold medal in the 54 kg category after the referee stopped her final match against Italy’s Biancamaria Tessari in Round Two. Neha Yadav won India’s fourth gold medal in the +81 kg category as she defeated Hungary’s Adrienne Juhasz by a 3-2 margin.
India could have had a fifth gold medal in the tournament but Ankushita had to stay happy with a silver, after being defeated by Italy’s Rebecca Nicolo in the 64 kg category.
Sapna (75 kg), Anupama (+81 kg) and Joy Kumari (51 kg) lost in the semi-finals by small margins to settle for bronze medals.