A stunning first round stoppage by Aryan Saed Panah (M85kg) of the Boxing Refugee Team was one of the standout moments on the second day of action at the World Boxing Championships 2025 in Liverpool.
Boxing in the second to last bout of the early session, Panah, who has been training under the Refugee Athlete Scholarship programme since 2024, completely overpowered Fiji’s Sakiusa Narara to set-up a last 16 contest against Austria’s Michael Derouchie.
It was a spectacular end to another session of great boxing that featured 32 bouts and included an upset in the women’s welterweight division, where Korea’s Sukyoung Kang (W65kg) upset the odds by defeating Brazil’s Paris Olympian and World Boxing Cup medallist, Beatriz Soares. The close-fought bout was scored in the Brazilian’s favour after the second but an aggressive final round from Kang swung the scoring back in her favour.
The evening session saw the super-heavyweight (M90kg+) contest get underway with fourteen bouts.
Cuba’s four-time Olympian Julio Cesar La Cruz was the headline name and showed that at the age of 36, he will still be a force to be reckoned with in Liverpool in securing a unanimous victory over Azerbaijan’s, Mahammad Abdullayev, who also competed at Paris and Tokyo.
Other winners in the super-heavyweight category that caught the eye with unanimous 5-0 victories included Norway’s Omar Shiha, Austria’s Ahmed Hagag, Jakhongir Zokirov from Uzbekistan, Germany’s Nikita Pitilov and the home nation’s Damar Thomas.
Thomas’s win marked another excellent day for England who won five out of five as Elise Glynn (W57kg), Sacha Hickey (W65kg), Callum Makin (75kg) and Reece Readshaw (M50kg) all enjoyed victories.
Other high performing nations on the day included India with four victories and Spain, Scotland, Türkiye, Georgia and Uzbekistan with three wins each.
Tomorrow is the busiest day of the entire tournament with 68 bouts scheduled.
The action will start at 11:00 (BST) and 18:00 (BST). The men’s 70kg competition will see Germany’s Paris Olympian, Magomed Schachidov take to the ring as well as the first appearance in the competition of Liverpool-local and World Boxing Cup gold medallist, Odel Kamara.
RESULTS:
All of today’s results are available at: https://www.worldboxingliverpool.com/live-schedule-results
INFORMATION:
The daily schedule, official draw, 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/.
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
World Boxing will be posting updates throughout the competition on its social media channels: