Shiva Thapa (60kg) and Mandeep Jangra (69kg) were among the four Indian boxers to make the semi-finals as country’s tally of expected medals swelled to eight at the Ulaanbaatar Cup in Mongolia on Friday.
However, the experienced L Sarita Devi (60kg), a former world and Asian champion, lost a closely-contested quarter-final bout to Chinese Taipei’s Shih Yu Wu to go out of the tournament.
Thapa, a former Asian Championship medallist, notched up a clinical unanimous win over Kyrgyzstan’s Ravshanbek in the quarter-finals. He will square off against local hope Battumur Misheelt in the last-four stage.
Also advancing was former Commonwealth Games silver-medallist Jangra, who defeated Mongolian Batkhuyag Sukhkhuyag.
Joining the established duo after recording victories in the afternoon session were debutant Vanhlimpuia (75kg) and Etash Khan (56kg) while Salman Sheikh lost a close quarterfinal contest to local favourite Gankhuyag Gan-Erdene.
Vanhlimpuia, competing in his maiden international tournament, defeated Korea’s Song Myong Su in a unanimous verdict, producing a power-packed performance.
Etash, on the other hand, had to slog it out a bit against China’s Jia Wei Lu before fetching a split verdict in his favour from the judges.
Thapa was dominant in his bout, producing a trademark calculated show, punctuated with lusty combination blows. His right hooks stood out and so did the fluent movement of the feet, which denied his rival any clear shot
India were earlier assured of earlier four medals through world and Asian silver-winner Sonia Lather (57kg), Lovlina Borgohain (69kg), Himanshu Sharma (49kg) and Ashish (64kg) advanced to the semi-finals.
With inputs from AFP