Olympian Nigel Paul and Ortega Jokhu will go into action Thursday, carrying the hopes of country T&T at the XXXVII Feliks Stamm International Boxing Tournament in Warsaw, Poland.
This after both Aaron Prince and Jeremiah Thomas were beaten on Wednesday in their respective bouts.
In yesterday’s quarterfinals of the 71kg contest, Prince, who advanced to the quarterfinals courtesy of a 5-0 triumph over hometown favourite Aleksandr Trofimcuk, went down to Finland’s Tiu Dorulet, thereby making his exit from the tournament.
Thomas, in his 80kg fight, gave a battling performance but had to settle for a 4-1 loss to Rafal Perczynski of Poland in his quarterfinal contest.
The fights, being used as preparation for the Central American and Caribbean (CAC) Games as well as the Pan American Games later this year, appear to be well on course based on the development of the T&T fighters, coach Reynold Cox said on Monday.
Apart from Prince and Thomas, other T&T boxers—Tianna Guy, Anthony Joseph, Nickel Joseph and Donnell Phillip—were all beaten earlier this week.
Paul, the T&T super heavyweight fighter who won a historic bronze medal at the 2021 International Boxing Championships in Belgrade, Serbia, got a bye straight to the semifinal, where he will take on Delicious Orie of England in bout number 117 of the championships.
Like Paul, Orie also earned a bye to the semifinals due to the number of fighters in the division.
Jokhu, in his 51kg division, also got a bye to the round of four, where he will come up against Polish fighter Jakub Slominski. The latter, unlike Ortega, had to beat Abdumajid Mannapov of Uzbekistan for the right to face the T&T boxer.