Kenya captain and Beijing Olympian Nick Okoth out-punched Moliko Armando of Equitorial Guinea in the men’s 57Kg featherweight class at the ongoing All Africa Games in Rabat, Morocco.
Weaving, bobbing and ducking, the Kenya Defence Forces boxer, who won bronze at the last continental Games in Congo Brazzaville savoured a 5-0 win over the West African to advance to the next level of the preliminaries.
He made up for the first two Kenyan boxers who kissed the event goodbye after losing on points during the opening Session One preliminaries bouts on Wednesday.
Light heavyweight Edwin Okongo aka Occox, who turns out for Kenya Defence Forces, lost 0-5 to Kaonga Mach of Zambia while Kisumu-based Akinyi lost to Moula Khouloud of Tunisia by a similar margin.
Despite the early exit of Akinyi and Okongo, Kenyans got another consolation with five byes, one in the 75kgs middleweight division for Cosby Ouma, the other in the 91kg heavyweight in favour of Elly Ajowi, Boniface Mogunde (welterweight), Ethan Maina (lightweight) and Shaffi Bakari at lightweight class. Cosby was scheduled to fight Togolese John Koudeha last night.
It was a bittier pill for debutante Akinyi and Okongo who were angling at reaching the medal bracket only to kiss the Rabat extravaganza on the very first day of boxing competition on Wednesday. On two occasions during the inaugural Indian Open 2018 and in Gold Coast Commonwealth Games, Okonngo was eliminated in pre-quarters. Boxing at the 2019 African Games punched-off on August 20 in Rabat, Morocco and closes at the same venue on August 29. August 27 will be a rest day for all boxers.
