World Boxing Championships 2019: Manish Kaushik advances to second round with dominating win

The only Indian in action on Thursday, Kaushik was advised by his corner to keep his distance from Kadyrbek and he executed the plan to perfection.

Kaushik will next face the Netherlands’ Enrico Lacruz.

Manish Kaushik, the 2018 Commonwealth Games silver medallist, barely broke a sweat as he outpunched Kyrgyzstan’s Uulu Argen Kadyrbek to enter the second round in the 63kg category at the World Boxing Championships in Yekatarinberg, Russia, on Thursday.

The only Indian in action on Thursday, Kaushik was advised by his corner to keep his distance from Kadyrbek and he executed the plan to perfection, with the judges ruling unanimously 5-0 for him in a thoroughly lop-sided opening-round bout. Kaushik will next face the Netherlands’ Enrico Lacruz.

On Tuesday, Brijesh Yadav (81kg) won his opening bout to enter the round of 32.

Earlier, Asian champion Amit Panghal (52kg) and the Asian silver-winning duo of Kavinder Singh Bisht (57kg) and Ashish Kumar (75kg) got first-round byes.

The world championships were meant to be an Olympic qualifier and feature the revised eight weight categories (52kg, 57kg, 63kg, 69kg, 75kg, 81kg, 91kg, +91kg) earmarked for Tokyo 2020, instead of the traditional 10 divisions.

However, the event was stripped of that status after the International Olympic Committee (IOC) lost patience with long-standing administrative issues at the International Boxing Association.

The IOC has taken control of the Olympics qualification process, which will now begin next year with the Asian qualifiers in February.