Tokyo: Debutant Lovlina Borgohain (69kg) assured India of their first boxing medal at the ongoing Olympic Games when she upstaged former world champion Nien-Chin Chen of Chinese Taipei to enter the semifinals here on Friday.
The 23-year-old Assam boxer prevailed 4-1 to make the last-four where she will square off against reigning world champion Busenaz Surmeneli of Turkey, who hammered Anna Lysenko in her quarterfinal bout.
Borgohain, a two-time world championship bronze-medallist, displayed tremendous calm in the face of a plucky opponent, who had beaten her in the past.
She was aggressive to start with, followed it up with a tremendous counter-attacking game and kept her defence tight in the final three minutes to emerge triumphant.
The youngster, who was laid low by Covid-19 last year and missed a training trip to Europe because of it, let out a huge scream after the referee raised her hand, pent up emotions finally getting the better of her.
India’s previous boxing medals have come through Vijender Singh (2008) and M C Mary Kom (2012). Both of them had won bronze medals and Borgohain would look to better that.
Earlier, Simranjit Kaur (60kg) lost to Thailand’s Sudaporn Seesondee in the pre-quarterfinals to make an early exit from the Games here. The 26-year-old Indian, seeded fourth, went down 0-5 despite a gritty performance.
She was impressive in the opening round and seemed to have caught Seesondee on the back-foot with her measured approach, sticking to a counter-attacking strategy. However, the judges ruled unanimously in favour of the Thai, causing Simranjit to be a tad reckless in the second round.
The Indian paid for the hyper-aggressive approach in the first few seconds itself when Seesondee managed to connect some eye-catching left hooks.
The defensive errors in the second put paid to Simranjit’s chances and even though she gave it her all in the third round, it needed nothing short of a demolition job to get over the line.
However, that was not to be as she bowed out following a unanimous verdict. The 29-year-old Thai is a two-time world championships medallist and also won a silver in the 2018 Asian Games.
Deepika crashes out
Deepika Kumari crashes out of Olympics after her dismal numbers against Korea’s An San. The Indian lost in straight sets 6-0.
An San, who is still hogging the limelight after she was part of the Tokyo Olympics’ gold-winning team in mixed and team events, is on steady pursuit to win the individual event as well.
San’s perfect-10 in all the three arrows of the first set was enough to unsettle Deepika who then hit a slew of 7s throughout the match making the Korean’s passage through her a childsplay.
Deepika Kumari’s Olympics dream has come to a dead-end with Atanu Das shouldering the archery medal hopes all by himself.
Nethra Kumanan disappoints
Indian sailor Nethra Kumanan finished in the 38th position in the 10th race and failed to qualify to the medals round in Women’s Laser Radial at Tokyo Olympics on Friday. Nethra was stranded at the 38th position in mark 1 and 2 before climbing up one position to 37th position and another spot to 36th place in mark 3 and 4 respectively. However, she dropped down to the 38th in the last mark, trailing the lead by 2 minutes and 50 seconds and ended her Olympic campaign placed at the 35th rank in the overall standings.
Good show
The Indian women’s hockey team defeated Ireland 1-0 here at the Oi Hockey Stadium North Pitch on Friday. As a result, India’s hopes of making it to the quarter-finals of the women’s hockey event remain intact. Earlier, the Rani Rampal-led side had suffered defeats in its first three group-stage games.
The first quarter between India and Ireland saw no goals and after the end of the first 15 minutes, the scoreline remained 0-0. A similar story was on the offer in the second quarter and at the halftime mark, the scoreline remained the same and it was Rani Rampal’s side that was feeling the pressure going into the third quarter.
MP Jabir fails to qualify
India hurdler MP Jabir failed to qualify for the semi-finals in the men’s 400m hurdles here at Olympic Stadium on Friday.
Running in heat fifth, Jabir finished seventh in the seven-players’ field with a timing of 50.77. Notably, Jabir with that race became the first Indian male athlete to participate in the 400m hurdles in Olympics.
