The Philippines was assured of two more Olympic medals on Sunday as lady boxers Netshy Petecio and Aira Villegas got through the quarterfinals at the Paris Games.
The twin triumphs of Petecio, a silver medalist at the Tokyo Games, and Villegas took some of the sting off Carlo Paalam’s 2-3 split decision loss in his quarterfinals’ match against Australia’s Charlie Senior. Paalam won an Olympic silver medal in Tokyo three years ago.
Boxers Eumir Marcial and Hergie Bacyadan dropped their match in the early rounds of Olympic boxing held at the North Paris Arena.
Flyweight Villegas, who fought early Sunday morning in Manila, squeezing past seventh seeded French pugilist Wassila Lkhadiri, with a convincing finish in the third round. Villegas Lkhadiri were even at the end of the second round—with three judges giving both fighters even scores while one had the Filipina boxer on the lead and the other had it for the Frenchwoman.
In stark contrast, Petecio stamped her class in the quarterfinals match against China’s Zichun Xu, winning in all five judges score cards for a unanimous decision that bodes well as she guns for another shot for the Olympic gold in her semifinals match.
The 29-year-old Villegas will meet Turkey’s highly-decorated Buse Naz Cakiroglu, 28, a World and European champion, in the semifinals of the women’s flyweight scheduled on 7 August. Cakiroglu won both her previous qualifying matches via unanimous decision.
Petecio, now 32 and could be competing in her final Olympics, with meet in the semifinals 20-year-old Polish fighter Julia Szeremeta, who like the Filipina dominated her opponents on the road to the semifinals.
The guaranteed two bronze medals came a day after gymnast Carlos Yulo won the first Olympic gold for the Philippines at the Paris games.
