Sri Lanka sends seven-member team for Asian Boxing Championship

By Susil Premalal

A seven-member Sri Lanka team will be taking part in the ASBC Asian Men and Women Elite Boxing Championship which will be held in the United Arab Emirates.  

The tournament will be held in Dubai from May 24 to June 1 in Dubai after the venue was moved from Delhi, India. It was scheduled to be held from May 21 to 31 but after the spike in Coronavirus cases in India the Asian Boxing Confederation (ASBC) decided to move the event to Dubai.  

The Sri Lanka team will leave on May 22 after conducting PCR tests.  

This is the first major international boxing competition Sri Lanka will be taking part in after more than one year since the viral outbreak. Four men and three women pugilists have been selected for this premier Asian tournament, Boxing Association of Sri Lanka President Dian Gomes told the ‘Daily Mirror.’  

The four men are Army’s Sajeewa Nuwan Kumara (Light Fly weight 49kg), K.V.L. Eranda (Fly weight 52kg) of Vidyarathna Sports Club, Army’s P.A.R. Prasanna (Bantam weight 56kg) and N.B.A.J. Wimukthi Kumara (Light weight 60kg) also of Army. The women pugilists are Rashmika Heshani Illangaratne (Light Fly weight 48kg) of Police, R.A.N. Pushpakumari (Fly weight 51kg) and K.A.K. Hansika (Feather weight 57kg) from Vidyarathna Sports Club.  

“We could not take in any international competition for a year and half because of the COVID-19 pandemic. We also could not conduct national pool training because boxing is a contact sport.  Tokyo Olympic qualified boxers will also be taking part in this Asian meet. We can assess the standard of our boxers only during this meet,” said Gomes.  

Nearly 300 boxers from 27 countries are expected to participate in this championship.   

India will be fielding a full team of 20 boxers (10 men and 10 women) including seven who have already qualified for the Tokyo Games.  

Sri Lanka, India, Afghanistan, Bahrain, Indonesia, Iran, Malaysia, Mongolia, Nepal, Pakistan Qatar, Syria, Thailand, UAE, Iraq, Jordan, Kazakhstan, South Korea, Kuwait, Laos, Macau, Philippines. Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan are participating in the tournament.