There was one big exception, but the men followed the lead of the women in Olympic boxing Monday in being mostly controversy-free. In one division, the consensus gold medalist in waiting looks to be on the right path but could have a challenge or two ahead (lightweight), another division looks wide open (middleweight) and another division probably got itself a new favorite for gold.
Every winner Monday is a newly-minted medalist, at minimum, just like the crew on Sunday and in the two days ahead.
(Soonchul Han, left, after defeating Fazliddin Gaibnazarov; photo via the Olympics website)
P.S. If you thought CNBC was going to carry this on delay, you weren’t alone. But they didn’t. If you’re a big boxing fan, hope you have access to a stream from here on out. [UPDATE: They did get around to it, just at a later hour than was originally listed on the schedule.]
Lightweight – 60kg/132.2lb
Vasyl Lomachenko (Ukraine)-Felix Verdejo (Puerto Rico), 14-9: Verdejo is legit good. It’s just that Lomachenko is so excellent he beats even good fighters by five points on the regular.
Yasniel Toledo Lopez (Cuba)-Gani Zhailauov (Kazakhstan), 19-11: With every performance, including this one, Toledo keeps proving he’s for real. Lomachenko-Toledo is a prime amateur match-up, even though Lomachenko has beaten the Cuban before.
Evaldas Petrauskas (Lithuania)-Domenico Valentino (Italy), 16-14: Neither two unnecessary, point-deducting -shifting warnings nor Valentino’s wrestling tactics could hold off Petrauskas, who somehow manages to be a sharp brawler, if that makes any sense. In other news, referees need to either break up clinches more often or stop penalizing boxers who try to free themselves from clinches.
Soonchul Han (South Korea)-Fazliddin Gaibnazarov (Uzbekistan), 16-13: Good performance by Han in a fight that started competitively, but that he took over. He could have his hands full with Petrauskas in the next round, though.
Middleweight – 75kg/165.3lb
Anthony Ogogo (Great Britain)-Stefan Hartel (Germany), 15-10: That Ogogo won isn’t troublesome, but that score is. The first two rounds were very close, and the 3rd was clearly Hartel’s, who controlled a tiring Ogogo and landed the cleaner blows. But you wish more people in these Olympics boxed with the full-fight intensity of Ogogo, especially our Team USA guys, who have/had a tendency to start slow in every fight.
Esquiva Falcao (Brazil)-Zoltan Harcsa (Hungary), 14-10: Falcao was impressive, and could be big, big trouble for Ogogo. Ogogo will have to work doubly as hard as he usually does, and he already works double-hard.
Abbos Atoev (Uzbekistan)-Vijender Singh (India), 17-13: No. The 1st round was close, and was scored that way, 3-3. Vijender totally took the 2nd and 3rd with his classy, scoring work, but lost them all to the mauling, ineffective Atoev. Not a good decision at all.
Ryoto Murata (Japan)-Adem Kilicci (Turkey), 17-13: These two struck me as the best in the division, so some other soul gets lucky that one took the other out. Kilicci led by one going into the final round, but he ran out of gas in the 3rd, and Murata wouldn’t let him breathe to pull out the victory.
Super Heavyweight – 91kg+/200.6lb+
Magomedrasul Medzhidov (Azerbaijan)-Magomed Omarov (Russia), 17-14: Medzhidov and Omarov wailed on each other pretty solidly, and it was close through two, with Omarav up. But Medzhidov legitimately had a big 3rd round to take it home. As much as we’ve been dumping on Azerbaijan in some of these scoring/officiating scandals, it’s nice to see a fighter from that country truly earn a victory, because I’ve got nothing against Azerbaijan personally.
Roberto Cammarelle (Italy)-Mohammed Arjaoui (Morocco), 12-11: I had a feeling Cammarelle might get pushed,as I wrote in my preview, but Cammarelle just nicked it, and had to benefit from a two-point deduction to Arjaoui to win it. I thought he won fair and square, though. Still, this narrow win said more about Cammarelle fading as the division king than it did about the determined but sloppy Arjaoui.
Ivan Dychko (Kazakhstan)-Simon Kean (Canada), 20-6: Easiest win of the day. Kean suffered a standing eight count in the 1st, point deductions shifts from warning in the 2nd and 3rd (the one in the 3rd a bit uncalled for) and got whooped the rest of the time.
Anthony Joshua (Great Britain)-Zhang Zhilei (China), 15-11: As dominant as Dychko was, Joshua was in there with a better fighter and therefore delivered the more impressive performance of the day in his division. He used his mobility and speed against the intelligent giant, scoring a right hand knockdown in a 2nd round exchange, and has to be viewed as the gold favorite now.
