Gorkha Boxer Shiva Thapa enters World Boxing Quarter Final

PTI

Kazakisthan : Gorkha Boxer Shiva Thapa (56kg) endured draining contests but came out triumphant to enter the quarterfinals on a bitter-sweet day for India in the World Boxing Championships.Asian champion and fourth seed Shiva got the better off Argentina's Alberto Melian 2-1, sixth seed Manoj beat Canada's Yves Ulysse by the same margin. However, former cadet world champion Thokchom Nanao Singh (49kg) and Asian Games silver-medallist Manpreet Singh bowed out of the event after losing their pre-quarterfinal bouts to more fancied opponents. 

"It was a very tough bout and took a lot out of me but I somehow pulled through," Shiva said. Shiva, a silver-medallist at the 2010 Youth Olympics, faced an opponent whose tactics were not too different from his own. "I tried to play it cool in the opening round and it could have gone either way because we were quite similar in our style. It was a 50-50 thing. He clinched it and I increased my tempo in the next two rounds," Shiva said. National coach Gurbax Singh Sandhu, while lauding Shiva, said it was one of the best bouts he has witnessed. "It was a very close bout and an excellent one at that. Both wanted to counter-punch, both of them had good footwork. But Shiva dominated the third round, which he won unanimously," said the long-serving coach.