Army, Navy, WAPDA dominate National Boxing

KARACHI: Army, WAPDA and Navy were going neck in neck as their six boxers each blasted their way into the semi-finals of the Chairman KPT 40th Men National Boxing Championship here at the KPT Sports Complex on Saturday.

After the 28 quarter-finals results till filing of the story these three major departments were seen giving tough time to each other.

Four boxers of Pakistan Air Force (PAF), three from Sindh and one each from KPT, Balochistan and Police qualified for the semi-finals which will be conducted on Monday (tomorrow). Asian bronze medallist Zohaib Rasheed of Navy also did well to make it to the pre-final by beating Jehanzeb of Balochistan 5-0.

In the men’s light heavyweight (75-80kg) quarter-finals Ajmal Pathan of PAF shocked the World Military Games bronze medallist Bilawal Zia of Army 3-2, Qaisar Ali Qalandar of Navy downed Balochistan’s Naveedullah after the latter abandoned the fight in the third round.

In the men’s cruiserweight (80-86kg) quarter-finals KPT’s Faris Rasheed got a walkover against Sindh’s Adil, Navy’s Hasnain Abbas whacked Mohammad Muqeem of Balochistan 5-0 while Army’s Zeeshan Ali defeated Police’s Ali 5-0.

In the men’s heavyweight (86-92kg) quarter-finals, Police's Waseem defeated Islamabad’s Usman Raza after the referee stopped contact in the first round due to injury of the latter. In the same weight Navy’s Anas Mahmood knocked out Amir Nawaz of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in the first round.

In the same weight Aimal Uddin of PAF got a walkover against Adnan of Sindh while Irfan Kan of Army whacked Niamatullah of WAPDA via RSC second round.

In the super heavyweight (+92kg) quarter-finals Azhar Ali of Army got a walkover against Zubair of Balochistan while seasoned international Sanaullah of WAPDA got a walkover against Yasir Jameel of Sindh.

In the minimum weight category (46-48kg) Jehanzeb Khan of WAPDA downed Tabish of KPT 3-2 while Asian bronze medallist Zohaib Rasheed of Navy defeated Jehanzeb of Balochistan 5-0. In the flyweight (48-51kg) category Husban of Sindh defeated Ameer Hamza of PAF to qualify for the semi-finals.

Meanwhile in the 4th National Women Championship featherweight (54-57kg) quarter-final Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s Sara Kifayat secured a walk-over against Zulekha of KPT.

On Friday night in the men’s light middleweight quarter-finals Shahab Khan of Navy got a walkover against Zahid Ali Khan of Sindh, PAF’s Idrees defeated Osama of Railways who got abandoned the fight in the first round.