National Games: Boxers Simranjit Kaur, Shiva Thapa cruise into quarterfinals

While Simranjit got the better of a gritty Rinky Sharma 5-0 in a 60kg first round bout, Shiva trounced home state’s Aniket Pandey 5-0 in a men’s 67kg clash.

Simranjit Kaur of Punjab (Blue) against Riny Sharma of Uttar Pradesh in the Lightweight category of women’s boxing at Gandhinagar during the 36th National Games in Gujarat.  | Photo Credit: V. V. Krishnan

Olympians Simranjit Kaur and Shiva Thapa gave commanding performances to cruise into the quarterfinals at the boxing arena of the National Games here on Friday.

While Simranjit got the better of a gritty Rinky Sharma 5-0 in a 60kg first round bout, Shiva trounced home state’s Aniket Pandey 5-0 in a men’s 67kg clash.

A 2018 World championships bronze medallist, Simranjit breached her rival’s defence to land some clean head shots in the first round before delivering good combinations on the counter in the second. She attacked with more intensity in the third to record a convincing victory.

Shiva used his experience to tackle Aniket’s raw aggression. The former World championships bronze medallist and a five-time Asian medallist maintained a safe distance against the taller home boxer and used his well-directed counterattacks.

“It's a perfect platform to assess talent. Many boxers have come up from 63.5kg and many from higher weights have come down, so the competition level has gone up,” said Shiva.

Worlds medallist Saweety Boora (75kg) and World youth champion Sachin Siwach Jr. (57kg) also made it to the last-eight.

Important results (preliminary round):

Men: 51kg: Karan Rupini (Tri) bt Suraj Soy (Jha) 4-1, Avinash Chandel (HP) bt Ruchir Srivas (MP) 3-2; Ramakrishnan Bala (TN) bt Aman Kumar (Bih) 5-0; 57kg: S. Sahil (Cht) bt Jobison Yengkokpam (Man) 5-0, Sachin Siwach Jr. (Har) bt Amir Tajo (Aru) RSC-R3; 60kg: Vijay Kumar (Pun) bt Krian B.K. (Kar) 5-0; Muhammad Etash Khan (SSCB) bt Harivansh Tiwari (Mah) 5-0; 67kg: Shiva Thapa (Asm) bt Aniket Pandey (Guj) 5-0.

Women: 52kg: Manju Basumatary (Asm) bt Hetal Sundarji Dama (Guj) 3-2, Anjali Sharma (MP) bt G.Ramya (AP) 5-0; 60kg: Simranjit Kaur (Pun) bt Rinky Sharma (UP) 5-0; 75kg: Saweety Boora (Har) bt Chirangi Chouhan (Raj) 5-0; Shalakha Singh (Del) bt D.Priya (TN) 5-0.