Felix Marcial Stops Semis Foe, Ph Boxers Still On Target
By Teodoro Medina Reynoso
PhilBoxing.com
Sat, 07 Dec 2019
Marcial.
Defending middleweight champion Felix Eumir Marcial made short work of his Malaysian semifinal foe, Che Azwi Mohd Aswan, stopping him at 1:54 of the very first round to advance to the finals of the 30th Southeast Asian Games.
Bucking the upset loss of John Marvin in the quarterfinals Thursday and Aira Villegas and Ian Clark Bautista settling for bronze, yesterday the country also advanced two others to the finals set on Monday through Carlo Paalam and Josie Gabuco.
Paalam made good his promise to avenge his loss in the last Kuala Lumpur SEAG battering former conqueror Mohd Redzuan from post to post in registering a 5-0 unanimous decision win in their semi finals contest at men's light flyweight.
On the other hand, Gabuco immediately established her superiority over her tough Vietnamese foe, Trinh in the women"s light flyweight semi finals to also advance to the hold medal round by way of a similar 5-0 verdict.
This prompted ABAP Secretary General Ed Picson to say thar the country is still well on track to win most of the gold medals and the overall championship in the biennial games boxing competitions.
Villegas lost a close 3-2 split decision to her Thai semis rival Nilawan while Bautista dropped another verdict to a familiar foe Butdee Dechan also of Thailand in the other semifinal actions involving Filipino fighters.
Picson rue the Villegas loss saying that Aira did enough to win but was not able to convince most of judges. He admitted though that Bautista lost to a better opponent in Butdee who is an Olympian and a veteran internationalist.
Thus far, the country has sent seven fighters to the gold medal round namely light flyweight Carlo Paalam, flyweight Rogen Ladon, lightweight Charly Suarez, middleweight Felix Marcial, women's light flyweight Josie Gabuco, welterweight Marlon Pianar and featherweight Nesthy Petecio, the last two advancing due to lack of competitors.
Three other bets namely women boxers flyweight Irish Magno and lightweight Rita Pasuit and men's light welterweight James Palicte will take their fate in their own hands as they figure in the continuing semi finals actions Sunday.
If they all win, the country will have ten finalists in the championship round on Monday which promises world class boxing action.
Click here to view a list of other articles written by Teodoro Medina Reynoso.
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