Lovlina Borgohain targets World Championship after Tokyo Bronze, ultimate aim is to win gold in Paris

09/20/2021

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Even though Lovlina Borgohain became only the third boxer from the country to win a medal in the sport at the Olympics -- she is not happy with its colour. Borgohain, who won a bronze at Tokyo 2020, now wants to bag nothing short of a gold medal at Paris 2024 and has already started working for it.

Despite winning a bronze medal at Tokyo Olympics in boxing, Lovlina Borgohain is not happy. She has her eyes set on the gold at Paris 2024 after she lost in the semis to Turkey's Busenaz Surmeneli this year.

“Mera sapna gold ka tha. Abhi mujhe gold nahi bronze mila, toh abhi meri Olympics ki journey adhuri hai (I dreamt of winning gold, but I got a bronze medal. So my Olympics journey remains incomplete),” Borgohain told Olympics.com, adding, “Till the time I don’t win a gold, I’ll keep fighting!”

In her bout against the Turkish opponent, the latter was too good for the Indian. She dictated terms from the first round and never gave a chance to Borgohain to play her natural, attacking game.

"I think Lovlina became too aggressive and that allowed her opponent to land her punches. If she had been a bit more technical in her approach then the outcome could have been different. It was like two lions in a cage. The Turkish boxer is a hard-hitter and Lovlina instead of countering that went to attack as well. She had to play a bit more intelligently," analyzed Sandhya Gurung, Lovlina's coach, to Olympics.com.

But after a break of a month, Lovlina is back to grinding it out. "She has been doing strength training. I told her now to get fit so that when training starts, there should be no excuses. She will return to full-fledged training once the nationals get over. Right now, the focus is on fitness," Gunung stated.

But Lovlina, since she was unwell, won't be taking part in the nationals, where the contenders for the World Championship will be decided.

"The boxers who will win gold will directly go for the World Championship while the Olympians can come directly for the camp. Lovlina will go for the World Championship because there is no such competition in her weight category. But in the 75kg, we have to see. There are a couple of good contestants. It has not yet been decided," Gurung said.

The women's boxing national championship could be held in the second week of October, in Rajasthan.