Pakistan pugilists crash out in opening rounds

Baloch follows Waseem in World Championship exit.

KARACHI:

Pakistan’s Nadir Baloch crashed out of the AIBA World Boxing Championship after a Technical Knockout (TKO) against Gautemala’s Juan Donis in his first round Bantamweight (56kg) category match in Almaty, Kazakhstan.

The first round between the two pugilists turned out to be a close affair with Donis pipping Baloch with unanimous scores of 10-9 given by the three judges.

However, it was a different story in the second round as Italian referee Albino Foti ended the match after two minutes and 29 seconds in favour of Donis because of a TKO.

Earlier, Pakistan’s star boxer Mohammad Waseem was defeated in his first-round flyweight (52kg) match 3-0 by Turkmenistan’s Zarip Jumayev.



Waseem had a close fight with Jumayev but his opponent managed to edge out the Pakistan boxer with scores of 30-27, 30-27 and 29-28. The Quetta boxer also received a cut on his eye during the bout.

There were high expectations from Waseem after he had impressed AIBA’s qualified coaches during a training camp before the championship. He had finished top of the standing after practice bouts between all the boxers in the camp but failed to replicate his performance when it mattered the most.

“The Pakistan Boxing Federation (PBF) should’ve sent Coach Ali Bakhsh with Waseem to Almaty,” a former national coach told The Express Tribune.

“Waseem was there for more than two weeks and had Bakhsh been with him, he would’ve worked on his mistakes. It’s good that he trained under foreign coaches but a local coach would’ve helped him more. It’s sad that Waseem lost; he had comfortably beaten Zarip last year.”

PBF Secretary Iqbal Hussain had earlier claimed that one of the coaches had praised Waseem’s ability and identified him for a scholarship in the US.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 19^th, 2013.

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