Asian Games: No boxing seedings means Nikhat Zareen & other Indian boxers face tough tests early on | Asian-games News

Nikhat Zareen, the reigning 51kg women’s world champion, will face the Vietnamese boxer she defeated in the finals of the 2023 Women’s World Championships in New Delhi in her first round itself
No seeding for the boxing programme at the Hangzhou Asian Games means that many of the Worlds best boxers might not need to wait till the final to meet each other. A field that isn’t balanced seedings has meant that in certain scenarios, top boxers face each other early in the tournament while in other scenarios, unheralded prospects get an easy pathway to the top. No scenario exemplifies this better than Nikhat Zareen, the reigning 51kg women’s boxing world champion, who will face the Vietnamese boxer she defeated in the finals of the 2023 Women’s World Championships in New Delhi in her first round itself.
Nikhat Zareen vs Thi Tam Nguyen, 50 kg (W)
Luck simply does not seem to favour Nikhat Zareen. At the 2023 Worlds, her entry into the 50kg weight category meant that she was unseeded and ended up having to face six boxers to win her gold medal. The last of those boxers was Thi Tam Nguyen, a Vietnamese boxer who won the bronze medal at the 2018 Asian Games and gave Zareen a tough fight in New Delhi before judges scored the contest 5-0 in favour of the Indian. But that score doesn’t showcase just how tough the Vietnamese boxer was and how the lack of seedings has meant that what should have ideally been the finals of the light flyweight event, will now be its first round. It doesn’t help that Zareen could also face Thai boxer Chuthamat Raksat in the semi-finals. She had faced Raksat at the World Championships in New Delhi and narrowly won 5-2 then.
Hasanboy Dusmatov vs Saken Bibossinov, 50kg (M)
A current world champion and the 2021 world champion both meet in the Round of 16 after a bout each. Welcome to the Hangzhou Asian Games where only one of Hasanboy Dusmatov or Saken Bibossinov earns the right to qualify for the Paris Olympics. Luckily for both, qualification tournaments in the leadup to the Paris Games means that losing at the Asian Games won’t be the end of their Olympic dreams. The lack of seeding also affects India’s Deepak Bhoria in this category, as he goes up against Japan’s Tomoya Tsuboi, who won gold in the 54kg category of the 2021 World Championships.

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While most Indians have suffered from this draw, Shiva Thapa will have an easy pathway to the final after he finds himself on the easier half of the bracket. The 2015 World Championships bronze medall’s only likely challenge could come from whoever emerges from the battle between Chinese Taipei’s Lai Chu-en and China’s Wang Xiangyang.
Nishant Dev’s tough run
After recently winning a bronze medal at the Worlds, Nishant Dev will likely face Aslanbek Shymbergenov, the current 71kg world champion in the semi-finals. Dev had lost to Shymbergenov earlier in the year at the World Championships but in order to even get on the win column against the Kazakhstan boxer, Dev may have to beat Japanese boxer Sewonrets Okazawa, who he is set to meet in the quarter-finals should both boxers overcome their matches prior to then.

Arundhati, Parveen handed tough starts
It isn’t just Zareen who has been handed a tough start amongst Indian women. Take the case of Arundhati Chaudhary who will be participating in her first-ever Asian Games and will have to face Liu Yang the current 66kg World Champion straight off the bat. In the 57 kg category, Parveen Hooda, who is a medal hope for India will go up against another Chinese boxer in Xu Zichun.