World Boxing: Focus on scoring for fair results
NEWDELHI: Scoring has been a grey area in boxing for as long as one remembers. The international boxing federation has tweaked the scoring system a number of times but the system is still not foolproof.
There is no major tournament where the sport doesn’t hog the limelight due to controversial scoring. The most recent controversy came at the Jakarta Asian Games when two North Korean boxing coaches refused to leave the ring as they protested their boxer losing a close bout against China. They wanted to lodge an official protest but in the absence of any mechanism of review or protest they could not do much.
They were kicked out of the Games following the fracas.
World boxing body, AIBA, said it will introduce a mechanism to protest or review bouts from next year. “The AIBA has been, in cooperation with the IOC, which advised to retain Pricewaterhousecoopers as a company to oversee or analyse the refereeing programme/structure and to give recommendations. So far the recommendations have been only positive for AIBA and we continue to working to improve the badly inherited referring system from the past,” said AIBA president Gafur Rakhimov.
Indian boxers have also been affected due to controversial scoring. The most publicised was during the 2014 Incheon Games.
Laishram Sarita Devi, part of India’s squad in this world meet, seemed to have done everything to beat home boxer Park Jina, but was stunned after the 60kg semifinal bout was awarded to the Korean, who ended with silver.
A tearful Sarita caused a stir during the medal ceremony when she refused to accept her bronze medal, and instead put that around Park’s neck. The world body banned her for a year for the incident. From the manual scoring till the early 1990s to introduction of electronic scoring and the current ‘10-point must’ rule, the system has evolved over the years At the 2012 London Olympics, AIBA brought out major changes in scoring, aligning it more with professional boxing, but there were still allegations of large-scale rigging of bouts. Eventually, after the 2016 Rio Olympics, AIBA suspended all 36 judges and officials. Bouts consist of three rounds of three minutes each
Five judges for each bout – position allocated around the ring as per electronic draw by AIBA Scoring System.
At the end of a round, each judge must pick the winning boxer of the round by awarding a score of 10 points. They must award nine (9) or less – up to seven – to the losing boxer, based on their judgement of the degree to which the he or she performed. The scoring is based on a ‘Ten Point Must System’
Every round must have a declared winner.
Scores of all five judges shall be counted in determining the winner.
At the end of the bout, scores awarded and the judge who awarded each score will be identified on a public display. It will also indicate the total score by each judge for each boxer for the entire bout.
Each official will independently judge the merits of the two boxers using the scoring system on the following criteria: Number of quality blows on the target area.
Domination of the bout, by technical and tactical superiority. Competitiveness.
The Judges must apply the following criteria to score a round: 10vs9 10vs8 10vs7 WP
Close round Clear winner Total dominance Win on points
At the end of a bout, each judge will determine a winner based on the boxer’s total score. The winner will be determined by:
Referee Stops Contest-injury or she is counted up to 10, the
(RSC-I) opponent will be declared winner If a boxer, in the opinion of the by KO. referee, is unfit to continue due Split decision by points to sustained or increased injury Three judges pick one boxer as from correct punches, the bout winner and the other two either will be stopped and the opponent pick the other boxer as a winner will be declared the winner by or adjudge it a draw (or) Four RSC-I. judges rule one boxer as winner
Knockout – KO and the other official either picks If a boxer is knocked down and the other boxer as winner or call it fails to resume boxing before he a draw.