Talented pugilist Kavinder Singh Bisht is one bout away from winning India’s first medal in the ongoing AIBA World Boxing Championship in Hamburg.
Kavinder Singh Bisht
The 24-year-old, making his debut at the blue riband event, beat two-time world championship medallist Mohamed Flissi of Algeria 3-2 on Monday night to book his tryst with destiny.
Kavinder will take on Inkyu Kim of Korea in the quarterfinals in the 56kg category and a victory in this round will assure him and India at least a bronze medal, if not more.
Along with Kavinder, Gaurav Bhiduri (56 kgs) , Amit Panghal (49 kgs) will also be taking a shot at glory and medals later in the night. Both have already qualified for the quarters and while Bhiduri will take on Bilel Mhamdi of Tunisia, Panghal faces a tough challenge against 2016 Rio Olympics gold medalist Hasanboy Dusmatov of Uzbekistan.
“I am very satisfied with the way I fought this bout,” Kavinder said, after recording a deserving victory. “We had analysed my opponent thoroughly I was knew exactly how to counter him. I would like to dedicate this win to the coaching staff for their untiring efforts and the BFI for instilling their faith in me,” he added.
The Uttarakhand pugilist is expectedly excited about his next bout and is confident of putting up a stellar show. “We know that Inkyu Kim is a tough opponent. But we will devise plans to overcome him and I will be ready for him,” he said.
As the narrow victory margin shows, bout was close and intensely fought. Kavinder had to be on his guard against the powerful Algerian but he showed his class by matching him punch to punch.
“Based on video analysis, we had a fair idea of Flissi’s tactics. His approach is to be aggressive
in the first and third rounds and defend in the second. I took the upper hand by being aggressive from the word go and ensured that the pace of the bout was to my liking,” he said.
India, however, missed out on two more medal opportunities late on Monday night. In the pre-quarters, Manoj Kumar (69kgs) went down to Venezuelan Gabriel Maestre Perez in a split 1-4 split decision while Shiv Thapa (60kgs) had to withdraw from his bout due to fever.