18 January 2004	Sunday	25 Ziqa'ad 1424

KARACHI, Jan 17: Pakistan's Noman Karim and Asghar Ali Shah qualified for the Athens Olympics and kept hopes alive for Pakistan as they sailed into the finals of 22nd Asian boxing championship at Poerto Princesa, the Philippines.

According to details made available here on Saturday the championship, which is also the first Olympic Qualifiers has entered the finals stage with boxers from nine nations competing in finals of Asian title.

Noman reached the finals by beating Manajonov Otabek of Uzbakistan on points 31:19. He took the lead in the first round and maintained it till the end beating Otabek by 12 points.

Asghar also outpunched Pechai Sayota of Thailand on 23:13 to book his place in the finals.

Noman will be competing against Zou Shiming of China who won against DPR Korea Hyok Ju Kwak, and Asghar will be up against Jong Joo Kim of Korea who beat Kazakhstan's Ozak Bayeb Danat in the semifinals.

Sixty-two boxers will feature in Athens Olympics 2004 from Asia. Out of these, twenty-four will be decided in this qulifier and other 48 will be decided in other two qualifiers to be held in China and Pakistan.

Following nations are now in the race for the Asian title: Kazakhstan 4 Uzbekistan 4 Korea 4 Philippines 3 China 2 Pakistan 2 Syria 1 Tajikistan 1 Kyrgyzstan 1.-PPI