EYES ON THE PRIZES
The allure of medals sees the intensity escalate
MEDALS were up for grabs, and Aaron Bowen and Rosie Eccles fought their hearts out to win them.
England light-heavyweight Bowen found himself behind on four of the cards after the opening round of his quarter final against 2020 Olympian Ashish Kumar (India).
That seemed hard on the wellsupported 23-year-old, and his work in the second round was better rewarded, leaving the fight in the balance going into the last, when Bowen and Kumar met in the centre of the ring and traded punches as the crowd roared.
Kumar broke off the exchanges and by the final minute he was dropping his hands and looking for breathers, while Bowen was still full of fight.
Bowen took the final round on all the cards to win a 4-1 split verdict.
Even closer was the women’s lightmiddleweight clash between Rosie Eccles (Wales) and Olympic bronze medallist Lovina Borgohain (India).
Three of the judges had them level at the final bell – and two preferred the front-foot aggression of the Welsh fighter.
Docked a point in the second for holding, Borgohain still led on three of the cards going into the last.
The final three minutes were made untidy by Borgohain’s holding, and Eccles deserved victory.
One of the performances of the day came from Scottish light-welterweight Reese Lynch.
He unanimously outpointed Namibia’s Jonas Jonas, who was defending the gold he won on the Gold Coast four years ago.
Lynch was quicker out of the blocks and once Jonas was chasing the fight, he was always going to struggle.
There were contrasting fortunes for English middleweights Kerry Davis and Lewis Richardson.
Davis was edged out on points by Mozambique southpaw Rady Gramane, while Richardson blazed back after being tagged by Billy Le Poullain (Guernsey) in the closing moments of the second to force a count and win unanimously.