Hussamuddin withdraws, Deepak Bhoria and Nishant Dev suffer close defeats in Boxing Worlds semis

Three Indian men had already made hory reaching the semi-finals of the IBA Boxing World Championships, making it the best-ever haul for the country at a single Worlds event. But on the day they could have punched their ticket to the finals, varying strokes of bad luck hit them to end India’s campaign in Tashkent on Friday.
The day started off on a sour note as the Boxing Federation of India announced that Mohammad Hussamuddin would have to give a walkover to Cuba’s Saidel Horta. The reason provided was a knee injury that the Nizamabad boxer had picked up in the quarter-finals. With a medal assured, and a host of tournaments like the Asian Games on the horizon, the decision was made to not aggravate the injury.
The other Indians in the fray were Deepak Bhoria (51 kg flyweight category) – the second choice for most of his career behind Amit Panghal, but now chosen ahead of the 2019 World Championship silver medall – and Nishant Dev (71 kg), in a second World Championship appearance that had taken him to the semi-finals. Bhoria was up against double World Championship bronze medall Billal Bennama of France. One of the taller boxers in the category, Bennama offered Bhoria a different set of problems to what he has had to face at these World Championships.
When Panghal is in the ring, one can automatically assume that he will be the shorter of the two boxers. The ability to quickly dart in from outside the range, land a flurry of punches and then duck out of range again is a hallmark of Panghal’s style. Bhoria’s style is set more towards counterpunching his opponent out of a bout. But that wouldn’t bear fruit against Bennama.
Changing strategy
The Frenchman’s reach advantage was sizeable and he was content to stay out of range and look to land his left jab. He was quite successful at it as well, rocking Bhoria’s head back on a couple of occasions. Bhoria started the bout with the strategy of holding back as well and only attacking when the Frenchman would try to land the shot. But at the end of the first round, that ploy didn’t seem to be working.
Either the lack of volume or his inability to land multiple clean shots was the problem. The second round was when Bhoria let go of his hands a bit more. While his punches weren’t always landing clean, there was a stinging right cross that landed flush on Bennama’s jaw.
He opened himself up to a lot more attacks and got tagged a couple of times, but the risk was worth it as at the end of the round the judges scorecards had levelled and the third round was going to decide matters. Bhoria was at his best in the decider, featuring a standing count that he delivered on his French opponent. After the bout, the scores had to be checked and then it went into a bout review, the IBA system where an evaluator and an observer log their own points to decide who won the fight.
The result was Bhoria going down 3-4 after three rounds. It was a razor-sharp contest where even one stray punch could have been the likely decider. There was also the matter of Bennama’s offence being easier on the eye as compared to Bhoria’s that could have swayed the result.
Dev’s campaign ends
India’s best-ever campaign at the Worlds has provided a new 71kg welterweight prospect in Nishant Dev to compete in an Olympic weight category, who now has a bronze medal at the Worlds to his name. The medal could have been of a different colour but against home favourite Aslanbek Shymbergenov, Dev went down 5-2 in a split decision that went into bout review as well, albeit this decision was not as close as the Bhoria one.
Dev’s wide southpaw stance came up against Shymbergenov’s orthodox guard. This was another size mismatch where Dev would often have to be the aggressor but at the risk of being within range of being punched back. The first two rounds went to the Uzbekan boxer but the close decision in both meant that a thumping majority in round three could land Dev the match or at least put the bout into review.
The Haryana boxer, who now represents Karnataka, put pressure on Shymbergenov and kept making the Uzbek take a step back. Shymbergenov’s output fell in the last round and it was a possibility that Dev would take the battle. But both the observer and evaluator believed that the home favourite had done enough in the first two rounds to reach the final.