Thai Boxer Kaeo Pongprayoon To Fight For Gold Medal

[george]

Thai boxer to fight for gold medal

BANGKOK, Aug 11 -- Thai boxer Kaeo Pongprayoon's quest for the Olympic gold medal for Thailand on Saturday continues, as he faces top-seed and defending gold medallist from the Beijing Olympics, Zou Shiming of China, in the men's light flyweight division (48kg) final at the 2012 London Olympic Games at the ExCel Arena in London.

The 32-year-old Kaeo was the last hope of Thailand for a gold medal, as he is the country's only athlete still competing in London. Thailand has bagged only two medals-- one silver medal from 58kg weightlifter Pimsiri Sirikaew and one bronze medal from Chanatip Sonkham in the women's taekwondo under-49kg category.

In the first round of competition, Kaeo defeated Mohamed Flissi from Algeria 19-11 then beat Carlos Quipo from Ecuador 10-6 before overcoming Aleksandar Aleksandrov from Bulgaria 16-10 and upsetting David Ayrapetyan from Russia 13-12 in semifinals round.

His next opponent Zou is regarded as one of the best pound-for-pound amateur boxers in the world. In their previous meeting at the 2011 world championships in Azerbaijan, Kaeo was beaten 14-8 in the quarter-finals. Zou went on to win his third world title.

Kaeo is fighting in his first Olympics which is likely to be his last because of his age.

The fight will be broadcast live to Thailand and thousand of people are expected to gather at Kaeo's home in Kamphaeng Phet and at his wife's house in Ayutthaya to watch the final bout on TV.

Millions of Thai sport fans were exepcted to stay awake and glued to to their televisions early Sunday morning to cheer the Thai boxer, as the bout would be live at 8.30pm in London and at 2.30am in Thailand.

If Kaeo wins the gold medal, he could receive awards of Bt100 million.

Thailand Boxing Association (TBA) president Boonlert Kaeoprasit reportedly said that if Kaeo won the gold medal, he would received about Bt50 million from the TBA's sponsors.

Meanwhile, under the government's bonus scheme for athletes, an Olympic gold medallist will receive Bt10 million. Several private companies have promised financial rewards for successful Olympians.

Four Thai boxers have previously earned gold medals from the Olympics: Somrak Khamsing in Atlanta in 1996, Wijan Ponlid in Sydney in 2000, Manus Boonjumnong in Athens in 2004 and Somjit Jongjohor in Beijing in 2008. (MCOT online news)

-- TNA 2012-08-11

[angiud]

Forza Kaeo!

[soundman]

Knock 'em down Kaeo!

Sent from my HTC One X using Thaivisa Connect App

[bigbamboo]

Cometh the hour, cometh the man and all that.

This is your big moment Kaeo, the chance to be Thailand's new hero...... and rich too!

Chok dee.

[Thai at Heart]

Would have been better if gee had had 20mn assistance before rather than the pressure of 100mn after.

Good luck

[el jefe]

Would have been better if gee had had 20mn assistance before rather than the pressure of 100mn after.

I think if you asked Kaeo, he'd say the opposite.

I hope he gets the gold.

[lostinisaan]

Kaeo is fighting in his first Olympics which is likely to be his last because of his age.

Knock him out in first round.

[chooka]

Is this Thai Boxing or normal boxing that he is competing in?

[Camelot]

Normal boxing.

He's got a tough opponent but Kaeo has 66 million Thais cheering him on. Good luck to him.

[Skywalker69]

Shok dee khun Pongprayoon.

[MrRed]

Watched both the semi's and cannot see him beat the Chinese guy at all who looked a very classy boxer,but with all that money hanging on victory who knows,can see the Chinese guy winning comfortably over the 3 rounds but i hope Kaeo does himself and of course Thailand proud.

[geriatrickid]

I hope he gets a fair treatment from the boxing officials that have left quite a taint over the boxing to date. IMO the computerized scoring is an unmitigated disaster. Worse has been the officiating. There have been some blatant examples;

- Turkmenistan's referee Ishanguly Meretnyyazov was expelled for the travesty in a bantamweight bout, where Magomed Abdulhamidov of Azerbaijan fell to the canvas six times in the third round against Satoshi Shimizu of Japan, yet still won a 22-17 decision. Meretnyyazov allowed the fight to continue after each tumble, and he enraged the Japanese team by fixing the headgear worn by Abdulhamidov, who had to be helped from the ring after winning. the AIBA overturned the resultsaying Meretnyyazov should have counted at least three knockdowns and stopped the bout.

- German referee Frank Scharmach was suspended five days for his decision to disqualify an Iranian heavyweight Ali Mazaheri in his bout with Cuba's Jose Larduet after several warnings for holding from Scharmach, who finally waved off the fight midway through the second round.

Boxing has always had a bad reputation and this Olympics has been no different. The IOC should just ban boxing until such time as the respective governing bodies can provide transparent, honest officiating.

[MAJIC]

Let's wish him good luck for the Gold Medal tonight.

[wellred]

He's lost the 1st 2 rounds. Not looking good.

[george]

Our man lost, but he is our hero anyway!

[george]

#Boxing And the winner is: Zou from #CHN by points vs #THA's Kaeo 13-10! The crowd is booing! Thai coach is furious! #London2012

[wellred]

Ya know he might have won it on the last round but the Chinese lad won it. Thai guy drops to his knees in disbelief as the ref holds up the other guys hand. Thai coaches refuse to congratulate the other guy too - very unsporting IMO.

If I had to guess a caption based on the Thai guys coach it would be 'so this is how farangs who hire jet skis feel'. 555555

Now get ready to watch a real fight.

Edited August 11, 2012 by wellred

[RAZZELL]

Bad decision and joke ref.

Entitled to feel aggrieved. BTW his coach Omar Peuntes Malagon is Cuban.

RAZZ

Edited August 11, 2012 by RAZZELL

[trajan]

Keao was robbed...joke referee

stadium crowd booing Chinese fighter.....even news boxing commentators (all neutral nationalities) were saying it was bad...

very proud of Keao....he won gold in my eyes...

[Jingthing]

Very unsportsmanlike conduct by the Thai boxer and his coach.

[BuddhistVirus]

What a joke of referee and judges.

Congratulations, Kaeo.

But very unsporting display by them. Respect the decision even if it is bad and goes against you.

Edited August 11, 2012 by BuddhistVirus

[Jingthing]

What a joke of referee and judges.

Congratulations, Kaeo.

He still would have lost on points even without the warning deduction. I think his behavior after the loss reflects badly on Thailand.

[wellred]

Questions raised over London 2012 Olympic boxing scores

By Anna Adams and Meirion Jones BBC Newsnight

Questions about the scoring in the Olympic men's boxing have been raised after a series of disputed results.

Last year Newsnight spoke to Olympic boxing insiders who alleged London 2012 medals could be bought.

We were told $9m had been paid from Azerbaijan to the international boxing authorities in return for two golds.

The International Boxing Authority (AIBA) denied any wrong doing. The IOC found no formal evidence of cash for medals as it stands.

However, some of the results over the last few days have raised some serious questions about the scoring system.

Eyebrows were first raised last Wednesday when Azerbaijan fought Japan.

The Azeri bantamweight Magomed Abdulhamidov won the match despite going down six times in the final round.

After an appeal by Japan the decision was overturned. The boxer from Azerbaijan was out, the Japanese fighter reinstated and the referee was on the next plane home to Turkmenistan.

Read more here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-19212567

Edited August 12, 2012 by metisdead
: Post edited as per fair use policy and link added to avoid copyright violation.

[BuddhistVirus]

What a joke of referee and judges.

Congratulations, Kaeo.

He still would have lost on points even without the warning deduction. I think his behavior after the loss reflects badly on Thailand.

So deduction of points on mysterious offense is perfectly fine if you are to lose?

[Jingthing]

The point is that was some of most immature losing behavior I have ever seen at any Olympics and it was from a Thai. Like it or not, athletes are ambassadors.

[RAZZELL]

Well, if you were robbed how would you react?

He should never have been given the two point deduction plus he easily outpointed the Chinese boxer in the last round.

Bad scoring, bad decision.

RAZZ

[wellred]

Yep, regardless of how you feel you should bite your lip and maintain your composure. He was unlucky but the behaviour from him and his coach was childish.

This isn't the 1st wierd result in the Boxing at these games. There needs to be an enquiry of some sort if you ask me.

[Jingthing]

So much for jai yen.

A boxer with anger issues. Who could have known?

[cdnvic]

I deleted one ridiculous off topic post.

[spongeman]

Watching it over here everybody thought he was robbed, and I am disgusted with the Chinese boxer who fouled his way through the bout, and the ref who was completely incompetent.

Any reaction by the Thai man or his trainers is completely justified.

Crowd gave their verdict, and they know who the winner was. FAIR PLAY.