Gold for Sanjeet; Amit Panghal, Shiva Thapa settle for silver in Asian Boxing Championships

Sanjeet (91kg) fetched the lone gold among Indian men boxers with a stunning triumph over Kazakhstan's Olympic-medallist Vassiliy Levit in the Asian Boxing Championships on Monday. Sanjeet triumphed 4-1 over Levit, who was chasing his fourth gold of the tournament and is an Olympic silver-medallist.

Defending champion Amit Panghal (52kg) had to be content with a silver medal after losing an exhausting final to known nemesis Shakhobidin Zoirov of Uzbekistan. The Indian lost 2-3 in what was a repeat of the 2019 world championship final, which had also ended in Zoirov's victory.

Also, Shiva Thapa went down 2-3 against Mongolia's Baatarsukh Chinzorig in a close bout in the final.

With 15 medals in this edition, India surpassed its previous best-ever show at this Championship, achieved in 2019, when the country secured 13 medals in all, including two gold.

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What went down in Panghal's bout

The contest lived up to the hype with both the Olympic-bound boxers engaged in a fast exchange of punches from the very first round.

Zoirov claimed the opening round.

But in the second round, Panghal raised his game by a notch, evading Zoirov's range with his pace and landing his left straights precisely. Zoirov, on the other hand, struggled to connect.

The two went all out in the third round but it was Panghal who was more impressive with his body shots despite an injured eye. He even had the judges' verdict in his favour for the round but it was not enough to alter the final score-line.

With 15 medals, India surpassed its previous best-ever show at this Championship, achieved in 2019, when the country secured 13 medals in all, including two gold.

On Monday, Pooja Rani (75kg) was the lone woman boxer to strike gold, while six-time world champion M C Mary Kom (51kg), and tournament debutants Lalbuatsaihi (64kg) and Anupama (81 kg) ended with silver medals after close losses in the finals.

Eight other Indians -- Simranjit Kaur (60kg), Vikas Krishan (69kg), and Lovlina Borgohain (69kg), and Jaismine (57kg), Sakshi Chaudhary (64kg), Monika (48kg), Saweety (81kg) and Varinder Singh (60kg) -- secured bronze medals after semifinal loss.

-India's lodges protest for final result unaccepted-

The Boxing Federation of India (BFI) on Monday announced that India has lodged a protest for the final result through a post on Twitter.

The Tweet read that India has contested the round 2 decision of the split 2-3 verdict and the surprise loss of defending champion Panghal.

However, a couple of hours after the bout, BFI took to Twitter to announce the final verdict on their protest.

The tweet read that protest lodged by Indian Team had not been accepted by the Jury Commission and Amit Panghal ends his ASBC Asian Elite Boxing Championships campaign with a silver medal.

(With PTI inputs)

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