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| Mark Anthony Barriga began his Olympic campaign with an impressive 17-7 victory over Italian Manuel Cappai. photo from Reuters |
After defeating Italian boxer Manuel Cappai with whooping 17-7 score cards from the judges, Mark Anthony Barigga advances to fight Kazakh fighter, Birzhan Zhakypov. Scheduled Saturday night( Manila time) in their round-of-16 light flyweight match.
The fight consist of three rounds with three minutes each. On the 3rd round of the match, referee deducted from the 19 year old Barriga one point deduction and gave credit to its opponent ending a 17 to 16 score in favor of Zhakypov. Barriga find it hard to defeat Zhakypov with its strenght and speed on trowing punches.
Being the best bet to grab a medal from the 2012 London Olympics, Barriga ends not only his participation on the Olympics but for the Philippines chasing for a medal on boxing, since Mansueto “Onyok” Velasco won the silver medal in 1996 Olympics at Atlanta blowing a Bulgarian opponent.
