-Amsterdam heads into action today
Arguably Guyana’s finest amateur boxer, Keevin ‘Lightning’ Allicock, enhanced his chances at a second Olympic Games appearance when he handed his Guatemalan opponent Jose Filipe a loss in the third round of their Men’s 57kg bout yesterday in Bangkok, Thailand.
Fighting in the round of 64 bout in the final Olympic Qualifier tournament, Allicock meted out a stunning assault in the third round forcing the referee to stop the contest with 1 minute 29 seconds gone on the clock. In the earlier rounds, the contest was closely contested with the duo trading punches in a show of resolute skill and determination.
Referee Alisher Palvanov from Uzbekistan made the call after Allicock seized the advantage and started landing consecutive blows with Filipe unable to defend himself.
At the time of the stoppage, the judges had the contest almost even on scores with three of them scoring it evenly at 19:19, while two had Allicock slightly ahead with 20:18.
Allicock will be in action again on Tuesday (May 28) where he will face Batuhan Ciftci of Turkey in a round of 32 bout.
Meanwhile, Guyana’s other Olympic hopeful, Desmond Amsterdam (80kg) will head into action today where he will square off against Christian Pinales of the Dominican Republic in the round of 64 in that category.
Two other Guyanese fighters in Joel Williamson (63.5kg) and Emmanuel Pompey (92kg) will also be in action later in the new week with hopes of qualifying for Paris 2024.
Allicock is the only member of the group who has attended a previous Olympics: having fought at the Tokyo Olympics in 2020.
