Uzbekistan continued to impress on day five of the World Boxing Championships in Liverpool, England is its men and women secured five wins and suffered no defeats on another day of top-class action at the M&S Bank Arena.
The Uzbeks secured two wins in the women’s competition and three in the men’s to continue the impressive form which saw them finish top of the boxing medal table at Paris 2024.
The early session featured 28 round of 16 contests in the women’s bantamweight (W54kg) and light-heavyweight (W80kg) categories and the men’s light-middleweight (M70kg) and heavyweight (90kg) divisions.
Some of the best action came in the men’s light-middleweight competition where Shavkatjon Boltaev of Uzbekistan and Frank Martinez Bernard delivered a dramatic match-up between two high quality operators.
Martinez Bernard had impressed in his previous contest and, after a close first round, seemed to be getting the upper hand when he floored his Uzbek opponent in the second to take the round 10-9 on all five judges’ cards.
However, Boltaev roared back in the third to knockdown the Spaniard. A warning and a point deduction for Martinez Bernard edged the contest in his opponents favour and was enough to see the Uzbek progress to the next round with a 3-0 points win. He will meet the number one seed from Jordan, Zeyad Eashash, in the quarter-final on Wednesday.
Hometown favourite Odel Kamara delivered another fine performance on his second appearance in the light-middleweight tournament. Buoyed by a noisy home crowd, he floored his opponent within five seconds of the opening bell and was rarely troubled as he secured a unanimous 5-0 victory over Canada’s Kuwardeep Manu.
In a session which did see a number of knockdowns, the most conclusive came in the heavyweight category where the Malachi Georges of the USA stopped Levente Hunor Kiss in the second round. It added to Georges’s growing reputation as a concussive puncher and followed his recent one punch knockout of Italy’s Aziz Abbes Mouhiidine at the World Boxing Cup in Kazakhstan.
In the women’s competition, Korea’s Paris bronze medallist, Aeji Im, had a scare against England Lauren Mackie at bantamweight. Mackie put the Korean number two seed under pressure from the opening bell, however Im’s experience enabled her to deal with the onslaught and emerge with a narrow 3-2 win on the judges’ scorecards. She will face Brazil’s Tatian Chagas in the quarter finals.
The four bouts in the women’s light heavyweight category saw victories for Gulsaya Yerzhan of Kazakhstan, China’s Qimeng Zhong, Emilian Koterska of Poland and England’s Emily Asquith, who all move forward to Wednesday’s quarter finals when there will be 64 medal bouts.
The evening session featured 32 bouts spread across the women’s welterweight (W65kg) division and the men’s lightweight (M60kg), middleweight (M75kg) and super-heavyweight (90kg+) categories.
The men’s lightweight contests gave fans the chance to see two of the most accomplished boxers in the competition as Paris 2024 gold medallist, Abdumalik Khalokov and Brazil’s Luiz Gabriel Oliveira progressed to quarter finals.
As has become customary, Khalokov, did not drop a round as he defeated Italy’s Giuseppe Canonico to set-up a quarter final with Zhexen Bibars of Kazakhstan. Oliveira’s victory was also unanimous and he will face Poland’s Brack Pawel in the next round.
Action in the men’s middleweight (M75kg) and super-heavyweight (M90kg+) categories saw a few upsets in both competitions and featured the stoppage of the tournament so far.
At middleweight, England’s relative newcomer Callum Makin, upset the formbook with a 3-2 split decision victory over Polish number four seed Michal Jarlinski while Ukraine’s Illiusha Pavlo did the same to the number two seed from Kazakhstan, Sabirzhan Akkalykov.
England also caused an upset in the super-heavyweight division as Damar Thomas secured a unanimous win over Brazil’s number two seed, Joel Da Silva. Another seed to go out of the competition was Germany’s Nikita Putilov, who succumbed to Uzbekistan’s Jakhongir Zokirov. It was another sign of the strength of the Uzbek team, which is currently the best performing in the tournament.
If Uzbekistan are the current team of the tournament then a candidate for punch of the tournament came in the men’s middleweight bouts where Canada’s Joshua William Ofori stunned Nuradin Rustambek Uulu with a ferocious right hand that ended their bout before the end of the first round. Ofori’s reward is a quarter-final with Callum Makin on Wednesday evening.
Earlier in the evening the eight bouts in the women’s welterweight competition followed the form book as the top four seeds, Liu Yang of China, Nien-Chin Chen of Chinese Taipei, Uzbekistan’s Navbakhor Khamidova and Yoseline Perez from the USA all progressed to the quarters and the chance to box for a medal.
Tomorrow’s session (Tuesday 9 September) will see the first guaranteed medallists of the Championships when the women’s light-middleweight (W70kg) quarter finals take place in the earlier session which starts at 12:00 BST.
RESULTS:
All of today’s results are available at: https://www.worldboxingliverpool.com/competition-documents.
INFORMATION:
The daily schedule, official draw and all results and additional information can be found on the event’s official website: https://www.worldboxingliverpool.com/competition-documents.
WATCH:
The World Boxing Championships 2025 is being livestreamed on World Boxing’s website via Eurovision Sport (available in selected territories) at https://worldboxing.org/watch-the-world-boxing-championships/.
LIVE SCORING:
Fans can stay up to date with all of the action in every session of boxing with live scoring at https://www.worldboxingliverpool.com/live-schedule-results
PHOTOS:
A free photo gallery of images from every session is available. Images can be downloaded directly for free – https://www.flickr.com/photos/203447206@N02/albums
SOCIAL MEDIA:
World Boxing will be posting updates throughout the competition on its social media channels:
