Glasgow: Indian boxers set the ring on fire at Hall 5 of SEC Centre on Saturday.
As many as 10 of them had qualified for the finals of Commonwealth Games 2026, and 7 out of 9 claimed gold medals at the time of writing this report, with one more Indian having a crack at finishing top of podium.
The winning spree pushed India up to fourth place in the medal standings with 13 gold, 16 silver and 8 bronze.
The final day of boxing competition began with Preeti Pawar starting off the gold rush.
The 23-year-old Preeti, first Indian female athlete to be appointed directly to the post of Nayab Subedar in Indian Army, notched up a dominant win over Canada’s Scarlett Savannah Delgado in the Women’s 54 kg category.
Next up, soon after, was Jaismine Lamboria from Bhiwani, Haryana. The 24-year-old Jaismine had a tougher time against defending CWG champion Michaela Walsh of Northern Ireland in the Women’s 57 kg final. But the class of the defending World champion prevailed in the end to seal gold for India.
About an hour later, Jadumani Singh walked in for the Men’s 51 kg final but couldn’t make much of an impression against Australia’s Jye Dixon. Jadumani had to settle for a rare silver medal at the end of the first session.
In the evening session, it was again India who continued to dominate.
Sakshi Choudhary handed England’s Ruby White a boxing lesson, easily winning gold in Women’s 51 kg. All the judges scored in favour of Sakshi who thus won a unanimous verdict.
Priya Ghanghas then entered the ring against Marie-Bathoul Al-Ahmadieh of Canada. The Women’s 60 kg final was a close affair. Priya looked to be tiring but staged a stirring comeback in the final round to win by a 4-1 split decision.
Arundhati Chaudhary had her work cut out as she took on World Championship bronze-medallist Chantelle Reid in the Women’s 70 kg final. However, Arundhati rose to the occasion and outboxed her rival to clinch a unanimous 5-0 decision.
Lovlina stunned in final
In the biggest disappointment of the night, Lovlina Borgohain had to settle for silver in the Women’s 75 kg final.
The Olympic bronze-medallist lost in a 1-4 split-decision to Australia’s Emma-Sue Greentree.
After dropping the opening round, Lovlina battled back to take Round 2.
Though never at her fluent best in the final round, she thought she had done enough to clinch the gold. However, four of the five judges had Greentree as the winner.
Men’s turn to pile on gold
Two men then strutted their stuff to add handsomely to India’s golden tally.
Sachin Siwaich produced a brilliant late rally to snatch victory in Men’s 60 kg final by a 3-2 split decision over Namibia’s Tryagain Morning Ndevelo.
The Indian trailed after two rounds and carried a one-point deduction. But then Sachin floored Ndevelo with a dramatic knockdown in the closing stages of the final round. In the judges’ scorecards, three went with Sachin to hand him a dramatic triumph.
Then came Ankush Panghal, who edged out England’s Dimeji Shittu to seal India’s seventh boxing gold in Glasgow. Ankush won 4-1 as Shittu was left rueing two penalty points that he conceded.
