Mark Anthony Barriga wins against his opponent Manuel Cappai with one-two combos enroute to a lop-sided opening bout win in the light flyweight division of the London Olympics.
With Barcelona Olympics bronze medalist Roel Velasco in his corner, the southpaw Barriga scored with a lightning left hand and was leading by five points going into the third round and finished the fight by a wide margin of 17-7.
Barriga enters the round of sixteen and keeps the hopes of a country alive.
Barriga completely befuddled his taller opponent with crisp combinations that easily found their mark. He unleashed a barrage of punches that forced referee Hassan Zoubid to give Cappai a standing eight count in the first round, which ended with the Filipino on top, 5-2. The second round saw Barriga pad his lead, winning the round 4-2 to enter the third and final round ahead 9-4.
Instead of slowing down, Barriga continued to pour it on, winning the third round by a convincing score of 8-3 to complete his domination of the Italian.
Cappai had a four-inch height advantage, but he proved to be an easy target for the cat-quick Barriga, who had no problem connecting with his punches and was hardly bothered by the Italian’s tactic of changing his fighting stance several times during the bout.
Barriga gets a four-day rest before plunging into action again on Saturday against Kazakhstan’s Birzhan Zhakypov, who edged out France’s Jeremy Beccu, 18-17.
The 28-year-old Zhakypov stands four inches taller than Barriga and is the more experienced fighter, being a 2005 world championships bronze medalist and 2010 Asian Games silver medalist.
Should Barriga hurdle Zhakypov, he advances to the quarterfinals where he will face the winner of a potentially explosive round of 16 match between Cuba’s Yousbany Veitia Soto and Beijing gold medalist Zou Shiming of China. Congratulations to Mark Anthony Barriga of Team Philippines we are proud of you. Keep up a good work. God Bless you all.
No comments:
Post a Comment