Lovlina, Nikhat, Neetu and Sweety in the finals of Women’s World Championship

Nikhat Zareen (50kg), Lovlina Borgohain (75kg), Neetu Gaghans (48kg) and Sweety Boora (81kg) stormed into the finals of the Women’s World Boxing Championships after resounding victories in the semi-finals, here on Thursday. While Nikhat defeated Rio Olympics bronze medalist Ingrid Valencia of Colombia 5-0, Neetu got the better of Alua Balkibekova of Kazakhstan 5-2. Two-time bronze medalist Lovlina stormed into her maiden World Championship final with a 4-1 win over China’s Li Qian.

Whereas Sweety won 4-3 over Australia’s Sue Amman Greentree. Nikhat (the defending champion in the 52kg category) is competing in the 50kg weight category. They used their quickness and tactical acumen to beat Valencia and continue to make strides towards defending their title. Nikhat entered the ring with full preparation against Valencia, who defeated India’s great boxer MC Mary Kom in the Tokyo Olympics.

Nikhat attacked in the first two rounds and then defended. The unanimous decision win showed Nikhat’s skill and physical fitness as the boxer from Telangana had to fight five bouts to reach the final. Nikhat said, “Today’s match was the best. I feel I do better when I fight technically sound boxers. I have played against him before and he is a very experienced boxer. Nikhat will now face two-time Asian champion Nguyen Thi Tam of Vietnam for the gold medal.

Earlier, the match between Neetu and Balkibekova was similar to last year’s quarterfinal. In this, Commonwealth Games champion Neetu and Balkibekova punched each other fiercely in the first round. However, the boxer from Kazakhstan was more dominant as she won the first round 3-2. In the second round, however, Neetu came back strong and landed powerful ‘hooks’ and ‘jabs’. Both the boxers tried to pin each other down but Neetu was able to seal the round.

The next three minutes were tense in which Neetu got the better of silver medalist Balkibekova from the previous round, prompting a ‘review’ of the match and declaring her the winner. Neetu had lost to this boxer in their previous encounter in Istanbul. “I played away last time so I could not recover. This time I played very close. “He said,” I have improved a lot now which is visible. Earlier I used to counter-attack from distance but now I can play according to the conditions. Neetu will next face Asian Championship bronze medalist Lutsaikhan Altantsetseg of Mongolia on Saturday.