China Open: Petecio saves Phl day

MANILA, Philippines - Nesthy Petecio finally hit pay dirt after several near-misses, overcoming tall New Zealand rival Alexis Pritchard to bag the gold medal in the lightweight division of the China Open boxing tournament in Guiyang, China Friday.

The five-foot-three Petecio cut down to size her 5-foot-11 Kiwi opponent highlighting PLDT-ABAP’s harvest of one gold, two silvers and one bronze in the tough international slugfest.

The Kiwi initially tried to use her long reach to keep Petecio at bay, but the dusky 21-year-old Davaoeña took some risks and waded into enemy territory throwing hooks, straights and uppercuts.

The three judges gave the Filipina a unanimous 3-0 verdict in the 60 kg. championship match.

Former world champ Josie Gabuco and Junel Cantancio both settled for silver medal.

In a rematch of their world championships gold-medal match, a vastly improved Xu Shiqi of China scored revenge versus Gabuco, 3-0.

A big consolation for Gabuco was a semifinal win over three-time world champ and London Olympics silver medalist Ren Cancan.

Meanwhile, Cantancio, 27, lived up to his reputation as a punching machine, but took more than what he gave to power-punching Viacheslav Supinov of Russia. The Filipino suffered a 0-3 defeat.

The bronze came from London Olympian Mark Anthony Barriga, who lost in the semis Thursday.

ABAP president Ricky Vargas sent a congratulatory message to the team, saying he is “proud of our boxers’ achievements in a tough tournament such as the China Open.”

The host country led the gold medal harvest with seven, followed by Kazakhstan and Russia with two each then the Philippines and Mongolia with one apiece. New Zealand earned two silvers while India had one second-placer. Only Mauritius failed to get a podium finish.

Other PLDT-ABAP team members were Roldan Boncales (flyweight), Nico Magliquian (bantamweight) and Dennis Galvan (light welterweight).

Coaches were Pat Gaspi, Roel Velasco and Elias Recaido Jr.

Delegation head was ABAP executive director Ed Picson while the women had AIBA international technical official (ITO) Karina Picson as team manager.

Team referee-judge was AIBA international R&J Ludy Therese Ceriales of Misamis Oriental.