Two Ghanaian Boxers Eliminated In the Preliminaries.

Chicago,October 25 2007:Ghanaian supporters who showed up to cheer their compatriots in the ongoing AIBA world boxing championship were terribly disappointed when the two fighters who were in action lost their fights at the UIC Pavilion in Chicago yesterday.

Samir Issah who fought in the feather weight division was outclassed by Imanov Shahin of Azerbaijan in the new two minute action time , four rounds per bout and one minute recess approved for the tournament! Samir lost by a whopping 24 :9 points against the more experienced and older Imanov.

Imanov fighting from the blue corner piled up points early in the first round and had the proceedings almost wrapped up by the end of the second round. Samir appeared relaxed , as if he was leading on points and did not show any aggression against Imanov. Imanove continued to build up points in the remaining rounds on his way to defeating the Ghanaian handsomely.

As if the Ghanaian boxers fighting today were destined to lose their matches, Awusome Yekeni who follow Samir in the evening session against Chinula Yamiko of New Zealand in the Heavy Weight division lost in one of the closest fights of the tournament by 14:15 points. Yekeni fighting from the Red corner led in the first round by 4:2 points. The hard hitting Yekeni appeared to have heard the loud cheers from the few Ghanaians on hand by taking advantage of his opponents slow warm up to the fight.

Chinula was the more aggressor in the second round after the one minute recess by winning the round by3:1 points and thereby even the scores at the end of the round to 5:5 for each boxer. Both boxers put up a splendid show of boxing skills, the Ghanaian showed a little more aggression but ended up in an even score of 5:5 with the retreating Chinula in round three to bring the scores to 10:10.

The fourth round saw both Yekeni and Chinula in a skilful display of pugilism. Yekeni would lead by a point , then Chinula would even it out in a few seconds. A second to the end of the fourth round saw Chinula landing a point to win the final round by 5:4 against the Ghanaian and the bout by 15:14 .

Most in the crowd however believe Yekeni could still qualify for the Olympic games if he continue to train hard and perform well in the other qualifying tournaments scheduled for the Olympic Games later next year in China.

Smallish but courageous Manyo Plange will carry the flag of Ghana high if he succeds in beating Yang Bo of China in the fly weight division. The bout is scheduled in the morning session which starts at 11:00 A.M.