AP’s Kranthi wins, draws attention of national coach

Visakhapatnam: Budding stars also shined on the second day of the 2nd Elite Men’s National Boxing Championship which is going on at the Swarna Bharathi Stadium here.

Assam’s Shiva Thapa stayed on track to win his second consecutive gold at the National Championship as he defeated Tripura’s Naveen Kumar 5-0 in one-sided fashion. Former World Youth Boxing Champion L Devendro Singh from Manipur trounced Arunachal’s Kumar Beyong by 5-0.

In another encounter, Andhra Pradesh’s K Kranthi, who caught the attention of national coach Santiago Nieva, had to dig deep to emerge victorious against Maharashtra’s Shivaji More as both fought tooth and nail.

As the home crowd cheered Kranthi’s heroics, his opponent didn’t let that affect his confidence. More threw a lot of punches at Kranthi but an uppercut in the second round really shook the local lad and the contest was halted by the referee before it could resume again.

It all went down to the third and final round of the clash and both the players realised the importance of the round. They went all guns blazing but it was K Kranthi who came out on top via split decision with a score 3-2.

“I have been practising very hard for this tournament and I feel I can win a gold in my weight category going further into the competition,” the elated Kranthi said after his first win of the championship.

The coach of the senior national team also agrees to that and said, “All boxers I have seen till now have been great but it is too early to say who will earn a call-up to the national team.

However, a local boy called K Kranthi has caught my eye. The biggest domestic tournament in boxing has a formidable field of 309 pugilists and will surely see a few come up the ranks as they rub shoulders with the country’s top placed boxers such as Manipur’s L Devendro Singh, Manoj Kumar, among others.