THE AIBA Women’s World championships began at the Barys Arena in Astana, Kazakhstan on Thursday.
The stakes are high for the Olympic weight divisions, this will be their last chance to win a place at Rio 2016. British lightweight Chantelle Cameron may have felt that pressure but she began explosively. Shooting straight across the canvas she hammered Jordan’s Lina Al-Fayyad with a straight right. Al-Fayyad tried to punch with Cameron but couldn’t match Chantelle’s power. The Briton handed her smaller opponent a standing count, then dropped Al-Fayyad with a stern, straight right-left combination, ending it all inside the first minute of the first round.
“It was good, just to get the first one out the way. I’m not used to it – I usually get number ones and twos the first round. I felt real sick, it was a big thing for me this because it was my last chance qualifier. Usually in my majors I draw the tough ones first. So I just had to get the job done. I tried actually getting it to go longer, because I wanted to get some ring rust out. I got the win though,” Cameron said. “Me and Lee [Pullen, her coach], we had a good warm up, the things we’ve been working on since what happened last time in the last qualifier, I knew I was going to go in there on fire and I was. I wasn’t looking to stop her, I was just looking to go out there and have a big start.
“Instead of going for quantity [of punches], I’ve been going for quality.”
Indian star Mary Kom got her qualification campaign off to a good start, working hard with tidy boxing to outhustle Sweden’s Juliana Soderstrom to win a unanimous decision.
American flyweight Virginia Fuchs denied Brazil’s Grazieli Jesus De Sousa a place at her home games landing accurate punches off her lead right and frustrating her with stern straight lefts. The Brazilian pressed forward in the last two rounds but couldn’t stop Fuchs taking a unanimous decision.
US lightweight Mikaela Mayer fended off the efforts of Turkey’s Esra Yildiz to win a unanimous decision.
Irish 51kgs Ceire Smith lost her first bout at the tournament. While one judge had it level, Colombia’s Ingrid Valencia won on the other two cards.
Valerian Spicer, a Londoner representing Dominica, halted Hungary’s Timea Takacs in the fourth round.
