By Aadi Nair PARIS (Reuters) -After three Olympics without any gold medals in women’s boxing, China won their second in as many days when Wu Yu beat Turkey’s Buse Naz Cakiroglu in the flyweight final on Friday. The Philippines’ Aira Villegas and Nazym Kyzaibay of Kazakhstan took bronze after their semi-final defeats. Asian Games and […]
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Olympics-Boxing-China’s Wu wins women’s flyweight gold
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By Aadi Nair
PARIS (Reuters) -After three Olympics without any gold medals in women’s boxing, China won their second in as many days when Wu Yu beat Turkey’s Buse Naz Cakiroglu in the flyweight final on Friday.
The Philippines’ Aira Villegas and Nazym Kyzaibay of Kazakhstan took bronze after their semi-final defeats.
Asian Games and world champion Wu, 29, added to compatriot Chang Yuan’s bantamweight gold on Thursday.
Wu began with real ferocity as she went after Tokyo silver medallist Cakiroglu, who appeared to be caught out by her opponent’s intensity and fell over while backtracking from the Chinese boxer’s assault in the first round.
In the final round, Cakiroglu had a promising opportunity when she penned Wu into a corner and unloaded a series of shots but before she could do much serious damage, Wu grappled her and the two boxers nearly fell out of the ring.
Wu was docked a point in the third round for repeatedly punching her opponent in the back of the head, but that penalty mattered little as she clinched the win by a 4-1 decision.
China’s women have been very successful at the Paris Games and can add two more gold medals to their tally if Yang Liu (welterweight) and Li Qian (middleweight) win their finals.
(Reporting by Aadi Nair in Paris; Editing by Hugh Lawson and Ken Ferris)