KARACHI: Pakistan emerged as new boxing powerhouse of the continent when their boxers grabbed three gold and a silver medal in the 23rd Asian Boxing Championship, also lifting the team trophy, on Sunday evening at Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam.
It was a rare moment in the history of Pakistan boxing when three pugilists — Asian Games gold medallist featherweight Meharullah, Asian Games silver medallist light-welterweight Asghar Ali Shah and SAF Games gold medallist heavyweight Shaukat Ali — became the new Asian champions of their respective weights. The World Championship bronze medallist flyweight Nauman Karim, who lost his final, got a silver medal.
Meharullah, the duminitive fighter from Karachi Port Trust (KPT), seemed to be in terrific form throughout the championship after remaining out of the ring for quite sometime. He outclassed North Korean Kim Song Guk with 35-16 points in the featherweight final to rightly claim the gold.
Leading from the first round, the Pakistani two-fisted warrior proved invincible for his rival, who remained defensive throughout the bout. It was the third major title for Olympian Meharullah, who also has the SAF Games and Asian Games titles under his belt.
Evergreen Asghar Ali Shah, who has represented the country in three Olympic Games in a row, overpowered Nurgozhizhenis from Kazakhstan with 37-26 points after a gruelling fight for the light-welterweight title.
Asghar, the Commonwealth Championship gold medallist from Karachi Port Trust (KPT) started the tussle slowly in the first round but gradually regained his confidence in the second round. With swift moves and vicious punches and hooks he made his opponent virtually ineffective in the last two rounds to bag the well-deserved title.
Pakistan’s heavyweight Shaukat Ali, the boxer from Pakistan Army, who has revived his career after a long lay-off, became the Asian champion a second time. The tall Shaukat subdued the challenge of Mahdi Ghorbani of Uzbekistan with 31-16 points. Shaukat, who is also an Asian Games silver medallist, possessing a long reach put plenty of power behind his punches to dominate in all four rounds.
Flyweight Nauman Karim, who revived his career after remaining out of the ring for a one-year banned period for testing positive in a SAF Games dope test, crashed out to Lee-Ok Sung from South Korea with 10-24 to be content with a silver. Nauman, the pugilist from Pakistan Army, started his bout confidently but failed to match the brilliance of his superior rival in the later stage.
Joan Tipon of Philippines, the bantamweight champion, was declared the best boxer of the championship.
Having won three gold and a silver, Pakistan annexed the championship trophy. Kazakhstan with two gold, a silver and three bronze, finished as runners-up while Philippines with two gold and a bronze secured third position. A total of sixteen teams could find their places on the medal table.
Following is the medal table (tabulated under country, gold, silver and bronze):
Pakistan 3-1-0. Kazakhstan 2-1-3. Philippines 2-0-1. Korea 1-2-2. Thailand 1-0-2. Iran 1-0-2. Tajikistan 1-0-2. Mongolia 0-1-3. Uzbekistan 0-1-1. North Korea 0-1-0. Turkmenistan 0-1-0. Vietnam 0-0-2. Iran 0-0-1. Syria 0-0-1. Japan 0-0-1. India 0-0-1.
Well done guys!!! We were up against some strong teams such as Kazakhstan, Phillipnes, Thailand, Korea etc and emerged as Asian champions, hope we can win some medals at world level as well. Mehrullah and nauman have performed well at world level as well.
