Punch within the intestine: India’s boxing contingent for Tokyo affected as qualifiers cancelled

A yr after Indian boxers secured a historic 9 quota locations for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, India’s hopes of sending one boxer in every of the 13 weight classes at Tokyo Olympics this yr obtained a jolt when the Boxing Task Force (BTF) selected Monday evening that the ultimate World Olympic qualifier to be held in Paris, France in June later this yr won’t be held.
Now 53 quota locations (32 women and men quotas) might be allotted throughout Africa, Americas, Asia/Oceania and Europe, to the perfect ranked boxer not but certified per area. India had missed on qualifying within the males’s 51 Kg, 81 Kg and 91 Kg and ladies’s 57 Kg class at Jordan final yr and with the Indian boxers nicely behind in BTF Rankings at current in these classes, India will ship solely the 9 boxers to Tokyo.
While Indian boxer Gaurav Solanki had misplaced out on incomes an Olympic quota within the males’s 57 Kg class at Jordan with a slim loss to eventual gold medallist Uzbekistan’s Mirazizbek Mirzakhalilov within the first spherical, Sachin Kumar’s loss in quarter-finals in 81 Kg and Naman Tanwar’s first spherical loss in 91 Kg had additionally meant that the Indian boxing contingent was hopeful of securing a quota in these classes in Paris. In the ladies’s 57 kg class, Sakshi Chaudhary had misplaced within the quarter-finals in 57 Kg class at Jordan.
Perhaps the largest sucker punch falls on the boys’s 57 Kg class seeing the presence of 2018 CWG champion Gaurav Solanki, 2019 Asian Championships silver medallist and world championship quarter-finalist Kavinder Bisht, Sunil Siwach and 2017 World Championship bronze medallist Gaurav Bidhuri.
The ladies’s 57 kg will really feel equally laborious accomplished by with the likes of Sonia Chahal other than Sakshi Chaudhary. Solanki and Chahal’s slim losses in Jordan had curtailed their hopes however Nieva was assured of them securing a quota in Paris.
“Obviously, we are very disappointed with this development because we were preparing for the world qualifiers and we had high hopes of qualifying more boxers for the Olympics. But we understand that these are unprecedented times and unprecedented decisions need to be taken. We were fortunate earlier that we qualified nine boxers from the first opportunity we got. I hope there is still a chance but I don’t want to speculate as that’s what BTF and IOC will decide in the coming months,” stated Santiago Nieva, Indian boxing’s High Performance Director, advised The Indian Express.
In the assertion issued on Monday, the Boxing Task Force stated “This ensures a new reallocation pathway, which is based on international on-field results recorded over the past four years (2017-2021), including but not limited to the BTF Olympic Qualification Events. To ensure utmost transparency and integrity of the allocation process, the BTF rankings were reviewed by an external auditor to ensure that all results have been accounted for accurately and in compliance with the BTF’s ranking system,” the assertion learn.
An up to date qualification system for boxing might be revealed as quickly as doable following the approval of the IOC government board.
From India, Amit Panghal, Manish Kaushik, Vikas Krishan, Ashish Kumar, Satish Kumar, Mary Kom, Simranjit Kaur, Lovlina Borgohain, and Pooja Rani have certified for the Tokyo Olympics. (File)
In 2018, IOC after session with AIBA, the world boxing physique, had rejigged the ten males’s weight classes and three ladies’s weight classes from 2016 Rio Olympics to eight males’s weight classes (52 Kg, 57 Kg, 63 Kg, 69 Kg, 75 Kg, 81 Kg, 91 Kg and 91 + Kg) and 5 ladies’s classifications (51 Kg, 57 Kg, 60 Kg, 69 Kg, 75 Kg).
While males’s 57 kg will see a complete of 28 boxers, highest for any class, ladies’s 57 kg will see 20 boxers in Tokyo and Nieva believed that had the Indians certified, they’d have an opportunity to safe a medal in these two classes.
“Men’s 57 kg has been one of the most competitive category in men’s boxing in India and any one of Gaurav Solanki, Kavinder Bisht, Mohammad Hussamuddin, Sachin Siwach and Gaurav Bidhuri could have won a medal in Tokyo had they made the cut. We took Gaurav Solanki, Kavinder and Mohammad Hussamuddin to Europe last year and they had some good wins there. We were planning that all the five boxers will get exposure till March before we held the selection trials for the world qualifiers. It was unfortunate that we missed on a quota in Jordan and we are keeping our fingers crossed,” added Nieva.
In the BTF rankings in males’s 57 kg, Kavinder Bisht is presently ranked 14th with 212.5 factors whereas Erdenebatyn Tsendbaatar of Mongolia is ranked seventh on the earth and is predicted to get the one Olympic quota from Asia in 57 kg. Similarly, Sachin Kumar is ranked twenty first in 81 Kg with 125 factors with Dilshodbek Ruzmetov of Uzbekistan with 290 factors is predicted to get the quota. In the 91 Kg, Sanjeet Kumar is ranked 29 th whereas Hyeong Kyu Kim of Korea ranked sixteenth with 150 factors is predicted to make the minimize for Tokyo.
In the ladies’s BTF rankings, Sonia Chahal is ranked 18th with 155 factors whereas Nesthy Petecio of Phillipines ranked fifth with 425 factors is predicted to get the quota. The final three years have seen Nieva chalking out choice trials forward of every event and it has meant that a lot of the instances, a unique boxer was chosen and earned rating factors in world championships in 2017, 2019 and 2019 Asian Championships, the standards for BTF rankings.
This sadly additionally meant that one specific boxer missed on accumulating all of the rating factors. “It was our strategy and policy to select the best boxer on form and hence trials were conducted prior to every event. It also provided us with having a pool of 3-4 boxers who could win medals on their day it is good for Indian boxing overall. It’s unfortunate that the qualification rules have changed and we cannot change that. We have to respect that,” added Nieva.
While the Indian males’s group had gone to Europe final yr, the group will journey to Spain later this month for preparation and Nieva believes that boxers like Amit Panghal, Manish Kaushik, Vikas Yadav, Ashish Kumar and Satish Yadav have labored on their weak areas within the final six months.
“We were lucky to start training in July last year and also trained in Italy and Germany. We have worked on adding more power to the punches and improving body punches. Mixing body and head punches is very important to win a medal in Olympics. Amit has worked on making a swift start in the opening round. Somehow he got more dependent on single punches, in which he has lots of accuracy and we want him to rely on combination of punches too. Manish had suffered an injury in biceps and he has worked on focusing on close range. Vikas has got a very good lead hand and has the best jabs in the world. We have worked on his rear hand punches which can be useful in Olympics,” added Nieva.