Olympic hopeful, Keevin Allicock will be the recipient of an Olympic Solidarity Scholarship
This was confirmed yesterday by President of the Guyana Boxing Association (GBA), Steve Ninvalle.
Ninvalle told Stabroek Sport that “We (the GBA) are happy to confirm that Keevin Allicock who is ranked 19th in the world in the bantamweight division, has been approved for an Olympic Solidarity Scholarship by the Guyana Olympic Association (GOA).
According to Ninvalle, the scholarship is tailored to provide the necessary assistance for training for the boxing standout.
“This scholarship will provide assistance in training leading up to the Qualifiers and the Olympics.”
He added “It would go a long way in preparing Mr. Allicock for the Olympic Qualifiers and I would say by extension, the Olympic Games.”
The Olympic Qualifiers for the Americas is scheduled to be held in May, 2021. A host country is not yet confirmed.
The quartet of Allicock, Colin Lewis, Desmond Amsterdam and Dennis Thomas started a three-month training stint in Cuba last December ahead of the Olympic Qualifiers which was scheduled for Argentina in March.
However, the pandemic grounded almost everything to a halt and even forced the four boxers to agonizingly remain in Cuba for an extended 126 days due to the closure of airports.
Fast forward to the present, Allicock and the three other pugilists will restart training from Monday with the goal of getting past the Olympic Qualifiers and representing Guyana in Tokyo, Japan in the sport which has brought the 592 its lone Olympic medal.
Ninvalle thanked the executives and the President of the GOA, K Juman-Yassin for approving the scholarship for the 2017 Commonwealth Youth Games silver medalist and hoped that other boxers would be considered in the near future.
“I want to personally extend a heartfelt thanks to Mr. Yassin and the Executives of the GOA. They have been doing an extremely good job as it relates to assisting the boxing fraternity and we do hope that they continue in that vain, boxing extends gratitude.
“It will go a long way and we expect Keevin to grab it with both hands and maybe in the near future, we can have more boxers being considered for such scholarships” Ninvalle concluded. (Emmerson Campbell)
