World Olympic Boxing Qualification Tournament 2024: India’s Abhinash Jamwal, Nishant Dev register comfortable wins in opening round

Indian boxers continued their winning run at the World Olympic Boxing Qualification Tournament 2024 as Abhinash Jamwal and Nishant Dev registered comfortable victories in their opening round bouts in Bangkok, Thailand on Sunday.

Jamwal, who has replaced Olympian Shiva Thapa in the Indian team for the second qualifiers, was at his dominant best against Andriejus Lavrenovas of Lithuania in his first-round bout of the men’s 63.5kg category.

The Indian boxer was clinical with his punches in the opening round and grew into the match as it progressed, before claiming a unanimous 5-0 win.

Later in the day, World Championships bronze medallist Nishant Dev also picked up a dominating 5-0 win over Armando Bighafa of Guinea-Bissau in the 71kg division.

Dev never looked under any kind of pressure as he controlled the bout from the very first minute and unleashed a flurry of punches in the second round too to put the opponent completely on the back foot.

A measured showing in the third round put the result beyond any doubt.

Among the 10 Indian participants in Bangkok, Sachin Siwach (57kg) and Abhimanyu Loura (80kg) had registered contrasting victories on the first two day of competition while Amit Panghal (51kg), Sanjeet (92kg), Narender (+92kg) along with women’s pugilists Jaismine Lamboria (57kg) and Arundhati Choudhary (66kg) have received first-round byes.

On Monday, Ankushita Boro will start her 60kg campaign against Namuun Monkhor of Mongolia while Abhimanyu Loura will face Kelyn Cassidy of Ireland in the 80kg round of 32.

So far, India have secured three Paris 2024 Olympic boxing quotas through Tokyo 2020 bronze medallist Lovlina Borgohain (women's 75kg), two-time world champion Nikhat Zareen (women's 50kg) and Preeti Pawar (women's 54kg).

However, as National Olympic Committees have the exclusive authority for the representation of their respective countries at the Olympic Games, athletes' participation at the Paris Games depends on their NOC selecting them to represent their delegation at Paris 2024.

India have fielded seven men and three women for the second World Olympic Qualifier in an attempt to obtain more Paris 2024 Olympics quotas.

At the Thailand meet, three quotas are up for grabs in the women's 60kg, men's 57kg and men's 80kg divisions. The men's 63.5kg and 71kg divisions each have five quotas on offer while the remaining nine categories have four each.

Indian boxers drew a blank at the first World Boxing Qualification Tournament held in Busto Arsizio, Italy in March.