Asian Boxing Champion | Deepak and Rohit Tokas advance into pre-quarterfinals

India commenced the continental showpiece with national champion Deepak (49 kg) and multiple time King’s cup bronze medalist Rohit Tokas (64 kg) sealing their places in the prequarterfinal on Friday with convincing victories.

Deepak was against Vietnam’s Danh, who didn’t make life very easy for the Indian. However, he lacked power going into attacks and made several poor decisions that resulted in Deepak hitting straight and being more impactful and clean consequently. He eventually won by a unanimous decision.

India’s other representative was Tokas and he was against a more aggressive Lai of Chinese Taipei, albeit no better than Danh. The Indian winner of three King’s Cup bronze medals had a much more disciplined approach than his opponent and hardly had to try harder.

Initially, the Taiwanese pugilist had given the hint that he was underprepared for the bout and to further compound his difficulty he was cautioned as many as seven times for not keeping his head up. 

Lai went in a raging attack in the last three minutes but Tokas was very smart in stopping him with a smart defensive strategy, which involved in limiting the Chinese Taipei international at an arm’s length while he simultaneously avoided the corners. The winner was unanimous in the end.