(MAR 2) The host nation
celebrated on finals day in Sofia with Bulgarian women taking
three Golds and a Silver from the five women’s finals.
Overall it was a very successful day for fans of the strong
Bulgarian contingent with their men also taking home Gold in two
weights.
Most successful nation in the
men’s tournament was Uzbekistan with five Golds and three
Silvers from the 10 weights in Strandja.
Just a few of the highlights from the women’s bouts:
China’s Cancan REN was comprehensively defeated 3:0 by Stoyka
Petrova in the 51kg flyweight final. You will recall that the
Chinese boxer took silver at the London Olympics losing only to
Nicola Adams in the final.
Christina Cruz of the United States did very well to reach the
final at 54kg when she was went down 0:3 to World champion
Stanimira Petrova having defeated China’s Piaopiao LIU in the
semi-final.
The local hosts had high hopes that Svetlana Kamenova would win
the 60kg lightweight title but despite some good wins earlier in
the week she was ‘no match’ for Finland’s Mira Potkonen in the
final.
The ‘Golden Girl’ at the recent Boras Box Cup tournament scored
a shock TKO1 victory in Sofia and Kamenova had to make do with
silver. The ‘Flying Finn’ had another fine win in the semi-final
when she disposed of
French champion and European silver medallist, Estelle Mosselly
from France 3:0
We have highlighted the rise of Sweden’s Agnes Alexiusson here
on WBAN in recent tournaments and she did exceptionally well
again in Strandja having defeated China’s Wenlu YANG in the
semis.
In the final itself she shocked Azerbaijan’s Elena Vystropova
2:0 – in a convincing win.
Nouchka Fontijn from the Netherlands has won many 75kg titles in
recent years but on this occasion went under 1:2 to China’s Qian
Li in a hard fought encounter between the world’s no 3 (Fontijn)
and no.2.
There remains a wealth of talent in that division including of
course Canada’s Ariane Fortin, England’s Savannah Marshall and
Russia’s, Iaroslava IAKUSHINA as well as Olympic champion
Claressa Shields.
It was however a disappointment to European boxing lovers that
as late as today (Sunday) the European Federation still had not
included the results from the finals nor any report thereon
whilst the AIBA itself was featuring ‘old news’ from a European
Junior Tournament and
A preview of the Strandja tournament some seven days after the
event had started. Followers of the ‘amateur’ sport worldwide
are receiving a ‘raw deal’ though some national associations
like USA,Canada, England,France and Ireland did provide updates
re their boxers.
The staff at the EUBC and AIBA are ‘very helpful’ but one gets
the impression that they are vastly overworked and understaffed
and trying to cope with not only tournaments like Strandja but
also WSB/APB and thus boxing fans receive little news from their
governing bodies and thus the service provided
by such as WBAN is now their main source of information. Worse
still the national associations of many countries provide little
or no information even in their local language.
The AIBA is a “wealthy organisation” and if it hopes to
‘dominate’ the world of boxing with AIBA events must do more,
much more to provide the type of LIVE service that boxers, their
coaches, families and others expect in the modern communications
era so PLEASE AIBA provide your fans and your Confederations
with a comprehensive information service and help such as the
EUBC and others financially for it must surely be clear to all
that the current service pleases few.
Just how ‘out of touch’ they appear to be to fans can be gauged
by the fact that the EUBC was updating photos and news from an
EUBC congress in Assisi (which took place some time ago) at same
time as they were getting further behind with results from
events like Strandja. Is that what the boxing public REALLY
wants especially as it was little more than a ‘photocall’ and
did not give any details of what was agreed (if anything) in
Assisi?
Wake up, AIBA or you will lose the support of more and more in
the AIBA family and fail to progress your plans for the future
of AIBA/WSB/APB and AOB boxing!
Women’s Finals:
51kg Stoyka Petrova BUL Ren Cancan CHN 3:0
54kg Stanimira Petrova BUL Christina Cruz USA 3:0
60kg Mira Potkonen FIN Svetlana Kamenova BUL TKO 1
64kg Agnes Alexiusson SWE Elena Vystropova AZE 2:0
75kg Li Qian CHN Nouchka Fontijn HOL 2:1
