Source: The Sangai Express / PTI (Poonam Mehra)
New Delhi, October 11 2010:
Olympic bronze-medallist Vijender Singh (75kg) crashed out due to a couple of controversial warnings in his semifinals, prompting an angry Indian team to lodge a protest, even as Suranjoy Singh (52kg) and Manoj Kumar (64kg) made their way to the finals with contrasting wins in the Commonwealth Games' boxing competition here today.
Suranjoy Singh (52kg) and Manoj Kumar (60kg) assured India of at least silver medals by beating Kenya's Benson Njangiri and Pakistan's haroon Iqbal respectively.
Suranjoy was his usual clinical self as he dismantled Iqbal, the younger brother of professional star Amir Khan, 9-3 in yet another dominating performance.
Manoj, however, had to toil hard to notch up a 2-1 win over Knowles.
The diminutive Suranjoy, chasing his seventh successive gold, downed the Iqbal rather easily with his brand of tempo-boxing that left the Pakistani gasping for breath.
The Manipuri Asian champion will face Benson Njangiri of Kenya in the finals.
"I didn't allow him to close to me.
I defended myself well and attacked whenever I got an opportunity," he said.
Although India is set for its best-ever medal haul of seven, the colour of the metal yet to be decided, it was a throughly disappointing day for the nation's boxers as they found themselves at the receiving end of some harsh refereeingthe most stunning being Vijender's 3-4 loss to England's 22-year-old former cadet champion Anthony Ogogo.
The Indian team has filed a protest against the refereeing.
"We have a filed protest.
A jury will now sit after the last bout of the day and they will review the bout.
Altering the result is also a possibility," Indian Boxing Federation Secretary General Col PK Muralidharan Raja told PTI.
If the result stands then Vijender, who won a silver in the previous CWG, would have to settle for a bronze this time.
All of Ogogo's four points came through warnings handed to Vijender in the third round by Canadian referee Michael Summers.
The world number one Indian was leading 3-2 with barely 20 seconds left on the clock when he was handed a warning for holding his rival after an engrossing fight.
The decision seemed harsh after Vijender was penalised earlier in the bout as well for hitting his rival on the back of his head.
The capacity crowd at Talkatora Stadium booed Ogogo and chanted 'cheater, cheater' even as a visibly upset Vijender made his way out of the arena without speaking to the waiting media.
Ogogo, exulting after perhaps the biggest win of his career, said a "boxer of Vijender's stature should not have acted the way he did in the ring".
"If you think the warnings were harsh then even I didn't get points for some of the clear punches I landed.
Even if he had not been warned, I think I would have won," Ogogo said.
Paramjeet Samota (+91kg) made it three Indians in the finals for the first time in the history of the Games as he defeated F A Junior of Tonga 6-2 .
But Manoj had to apply his mind against a tactful rival and just about managed to make it through for the biggest triumph of his career, which had gone haywire after a wrist injury.
"I never put myself under pressure by thinking too much about whether I would win or lose and I am glad to have made it this far," he said.
Manoj will be up against Bradley Saunders of England in his summit clash.
Earlier, Commonwealth Championships gold medallist Amandeep Singh (49kg), Asian silver medallist Jai Bhagwan (60kg) and nine-time national champion Dilbag Singh (69kg) had to be content with bronze medals after losing exciting semifinal bouts.
Amandeep lost 5-0 to Olympic bronze medallist and European champion Paddy Barnes of Northern Ireland, Jai went down 5-10 to European Championship silver medallist Thomas Stalker of England and Dilbag was beaten 4-5 in a thrilling contest against Northern Ireland's Patrick Gallagher.
Amandeep was the first to take the ring for India today and he just could not break Barnes' shell guard despite his best efforts.
The Punjab boxer tried everything from hooks to uppercuts to some hard-hitting straight punches to break through Barnes's defence but the Irish boxer didn't give any chance to the crowd favourite.
The first round had Barnes leading 2-0 and the Olympian's brilliant anticipation of Amandeep's attack ensured that he did not concede a single point even in the next two rounds.
"I tried everything to break his guard but it just didn't happen.
I was hitting a lot of uppercuts but it didn't work," said a disappointed Amandeep.
"But I am happy to have won a medal in my very first Commonwealth Games," he added.
National coach Gurbax Singh Sandhu said Amandeep's performance was also affected by the surprise dope test that he had give yesterday.