Devendro in Mongolian tourney final

Commonwealth Games silver-medallist L Devendro Singh (52kg) advanced to the final along with the young Ankush Dahiya (60kg) on another mixed day for Indian boxers at the Ulaanbaatar Cup in Mongolia on Saturday.

Devendro defeated Mongolia’s Gandulam Mungun-Erdene in a unanimous verdict, while Ankush, a former Asian youth silver-medallist, got the better of Russia’s Radna Tsibikov in a split decision. However, three others -K Shyam Kumar (49kg), Mohammed Hussamuddin (56kg) and Priyanka Chaudhary (60kg) -- lost their respective semifinal bouts to settle to bronze medals.

In Sunday’s final bouts, Devendro, putting up his best performance of the year so far, will be up against Indonesia’s Aldoms Suguro. The 25-year-old former Asian silver-medallist has looked sharp in the tournament with improved fitness making quite a difference to his performance.

The 19-year-old Ankush, on the other hand, will fight it out with Korean Man Choe Chol. This is Ankush’s second international tournament since making the transition from youth to elite level late last year.

Shyam Kumar, a gold-medallist from this year’s King’s Cup in Thailand, lost a split verdict to Filipino Rogen Ladon. Hussamuddin was beaten by Mongolia’s Bat-Ochir Tumurkhuyag in his semifinal bout.

INDIAN MEN HELD BY TURKEY

Krishnan Sasikiran proved to be the saviour as Indian men were held 2-2 by Turkey while the Indian women suffered a 1-3 loss against Russia in the sixth round of World teams’ chess championships here.