Nishant books Paris Olympics ticket

Nishant Dev (71kg) became the first Indian male pugilist to secure a Paris Games quota when he reached the semifinals of the Boxing Olympic qualifiers here on Friday.

The world championships bronze medalist, who had narrowly missed on an Olympic berth in the previous qualifiers, earned the quota after defeating Vasile Cebotari of Moldova 5-0 in the quarterfinal which was a battle of the southpaws.

It is India's fourth quota place with women boxers Nikhat Zareen (50kg), Preet Pawar (54kg) and Lovlina Borgohain (75kg) having already secured their passage to Paris.

The 71kg weight class had five quotas on offer. Nishant, who has been dominant all tournament, was off to a flyer, landing sharp, accurate punches. The Indian was more composed and used his punches judiciously.

In the second round, Cebotari landed a couple of blows and Dev looked a bit out of breath but the Indian continued to hit accurate shots.

In the last three minutes, both boxers looked spent but Dev continued to land punches at will. Cebotari earned a point deduction for his punch to Dev when the Indian was down on the canvas.

"I'm very happy to see Nishant book his place in the Indian contingent for the Paris Olympics. He's come really close to qualifying previously and deserves to be there. We've been directly involved in Nishant's progress since he was just 15 years old, and he has turned out to be one of the best boxers in the 71 kg weight category in the world. Now that his qualification is secure, we're going to start focusing on the Games," said Manisha Malhotra, Head of Sports Excellence and Scouting at JSW Sports.

Earlier, India's quest for booking a quota in the women's 60kg ended with Ankushita Boro 2-3 defeat against Agnes Alexiusson of Sweden in the quarterfinals.

Later in the day, Arundhati Choudhary (66kg) and Amit Panghal (51kg) will be in action.