Down to three: Sobbering outing for Hit Squad in Serbia
.jpg)
Reading Time: 2min | Wed. 12.03.25. | 18:50
Wednesday's night session will hopefully be one to save face, this as a Kenyan win stays elusive
Kenya’s quest of claiming a first medal at the IBA Women's World Boxing Championships will go into another night - Wednesday 12 March - following a disappointing show in Nis, Serbia thus far.
On Tuesday, Kenya’s Hit Squad saw four of their boxers eliminated in the first round, this coming just days after African Military Games silver medalist Veronica Mbithe had been sent packing last Sunday, following her Round of 32 points loss to Kazakh Balkibekova Alua.
As earlier foreshadowed by coach Musa Benjamin, the championships were not going to be a walk in the park for Kenya - and especially the tournament debutants.
Such was the case for KDF’s Cynthia Mwai, who suffered a convincing defeat to Mexico’s Miriam Hernandez in her light-welterweight bout.
The young debutant, in her first global outing of any kind, could not get past the second round, forcing the referee to stop the fight.
Kenya’s first female boxer to win a medal at the African Games - Amina Martha - also met stern opposition in her bid to win her Round of 16 fight, going down to Russia’s Karina Tazabekova.
Friza Anyango faced a similar fate as Martha - a 5-0 points defeat - after going down to Slovakia’s Tamara Kubalova.
Wrapping up a sobering day for the Kenyan outfit was another overwhelming defeat from debutant Emily Juma, who lost 5-0 on points to Slovakia’s Miroslava Jedinakova.
The four losses means that Kenya has five of their eight boxers already out of the competition, and will only be thankful that two of the remaining trio were handed walk-overs earlier this week after their opponents failed to secure travel visas to Serbia.
The duo, who are now through to the last 16, will hope to reverse the sorry Kenyan tide when they take to the ring for the first time on Wednesday night.
Up first will be KDF’s Pauline Chege, who will take on Tajikistan’s Mijgona Samadova in Session 6A, as the last of Hit Squad’s debutants - Lencer Akinyi - faces off with Russia’s Dragana Jovanovic in Session 7A.
.jpg)
