KARACHI, May 15: Karachi Port Trust (KPT) and Pakistan Army were declared “joint champions” of the national junior boxing championship in what turned out to be a controversial decision as the organizers blundered while tabulating points on the final day on Sunday.
Although the KPT should have been declared champions as they scooped up four golds, surprisingly the Pakistan Boxing Federation (PBF), the organizers, decided the overall winners on points’ basis.
Ghulam Hussain Patni, a member of the jury, told Dawn the winners had been decided on the basis of points as instructed by the PBF chairman Anwar Chowdhry.
Interestingly, if one goes by the criteria for the championship laid by the PBF, then Army should have been the winners with 16 points followed by the KPT who had 15 points.
The Army claimed three gold medals, two silvers and three bronze, while the KPT secured four golds, one silver and one bronze. The gold medals carried three points, silver two, and bronze three.
Surprisingly, the points table provided by Ghulam Hussain showed the KPT and the Army sharing the trophy with 15 points. Not only the third bronze claimed by the Army was missing from the points table, the organizers also goofed when they mentioned Mohammad Asif as KPT’s lightweight bronze medal winner who was in fact a KESC boxer.
While the competition, which was for pugilists aged 17 to 19 years, became a farce after the blooper by the organizers, it also lost its credibility and importance because quite a few boxers were over-aged, especially in the light-heavyweight and heavyweight categories.
It may be mentioned Pakistan team will be selected in the same age group for next month’s Asian junior championship which is to be organized at the same venue – KPT Sports Complex. Pakistan coach Reinaldo Alvarez has been asked to select the boxers for the Asian event on the basis of national championship’s performance.
The most interesting fight of the day was the featherweight bout between KESC’s Rauf and Mohammad Tariq of Wapda. Tariq got off to a perfect start with better reach and Rauf got shaky in the second round.
Rauf, however, came back with renewed vigour in the third round, although Tariq was trying to utilise his height. Tariq could not prevail over Rauf who scored some vital points in the end.
Although Tariq once had Rauf on the ropes seconds into the final round, Rauf fought hard and emerged a close 15-14 victor.
Asian junior lightweight bronze medallist Karrar Hussain of KPT, wisely adjudged the best boxer of the championship, was impressive against taller Sajjad Qambrani of Sindh.
Despite being surprised by the aggressive start by Sajjad in the second round, Karrar used his international experience and was at ease as he did not face difficulty in becoming a winner after the RSC verdict went in his favour.
Apart from Karrar, three more KPT boxers who grabbed golds were bantamweight Ali Mohammad, welterweight Jan Mohammad and middleweight Dur Mohammad.
Light-flyweight Zubair of KESC, who scored an upset quarterfinal victory over Mohammad Nisar of KPT, ended his winning run after losing to Army’s Khaliq Mahmood 21-40.
Yasir Jawaid of Army won against Sindh’s Taqveem Qaiser on RSC/OS decision in the first round of light-heavyweight fight, while team-mate heavyweight Barkat Ali also walked away winner against Ishaq Khan of NWFP in a similar fashion.
Results (finals):
Light-flyweight: Khaliq Mahmood (Army) bt Zubair (KESC) 40-21. Ziarat Gul (NWFP) and Jibran Muna (Sindh) (bronze).
Flyweight: Aneel Hussain (KESC) bt Mohammad Ali (KPT) 54-28. Abid Hussain (Army) and Liaquat Ali (Wapda) (bronze).
Bantamweight: Ali Mohammad (KPT) bt Bilal Ghazi (Army) 46-25. Waqas Khan (NWFP) and Akbar Ali (KESC) (bronze).
Featherweight: Rauf (KESC) bt Mohammad Tariq (Wapda) 15-14. Sheeraz (KPT) and Mohammad Ifra (Punjab) (bronze).
Lightweight: Karrar Hussain (KPT) bt Sajjad Qambrani (Sindh) RSC/II. Mohammad Asif (KESC) and Sajjad Hussain (Army) (bronze).
Light-welterweight: Shahid Hussain (Navy) bt Mohammad Yousuf (Punjab) (25-15) OS/III. Kaleemullah (Wapda) and Shoaib Baloch (Sindh) (bronze).
Welterweight: Jan Mohammad (KPT) bt Samiullah (Army) 11-3. Mohammad Amir (Wapda) and Ehtesham (NWFP) (bronze).
Middleweight: Dur Mohammad (KPT) bt Abdul Sattar (NWFP) retired/I. Asad Abbas (Army) and Nadir Khan (Sindh) (bronze).
Light-heavyweight: Yasir Jawaid (Army) bt Taqveem Qaiser (Sindh) RSC/OS/I. Saqib (Punjab) and Zahoor Khan (NWFP) (bronze).
Heavyweight: Barkat Ali (Army) bt Ishaq Khan (NWFP) RSC/OS/I.
