Tashkent, May 11 (HS). Boxers Deepak Bhoria (51kg), Mohd Hussamuddin (57kg) and Nishant Dev (71kg) assured India three medals by advancing to the semi-finals of the men’s World Championships here on Wednesday. Quarter-final wins meant all three boxers At least bronze medal is confirmed. India’s previous best performance came in the 2019 edition when Amit Panghal won an unprecedented silver and Manish Kaushik won a bronze.
Opening the campaign for India, Deepak continued his impressive run in the flyweight category by defeating Nurzhigit Dushebaev of Kyrgyzstan with a 5-0 unanimous decision. He will now face B Benama of France in the semi-finals on Friday. Hussamuddin, a two-time Commonwealth Games bronze medallist, won a closely fought 4-3 split decision against Bulgaria’s J Diaz Ibanez. Hussamuddin will face Cuba’s Saidel Horta in the semi-finals. At the same time, Nishant knocked out Jorge Cuellar of Cuba by unanimous decision.
The 22-year-old, who is the defending national champion, kept attacking the Cuban boxer for the entire nine minutes. Nishant, who had made a quarterfinal exit in the previous edition, was determined not to make it past the last eight again. He was faster than his opponent and landed a flurry of punches to Cuellar’s face. He also used body blows to wear down his opponent and make it to the last four in the light middleweight division. Nishant will take on Asian champion Aslanbek Shimbergenov of Kazakhstan for a place in the final.
