By MOSES CHIMFWEMBE –
BOXER Emmanuel Ngoma yesterday proved to be a thorn in his opponents’ flesh as he produced an outstanding performance to mint Zambia’s first medal at the ongoing 2015 Commonwealth Youth Games in Samoa.
Ngoma began his campaign on a high, knocking out Malaysian boxer Muhammad Azuan in the first round of the preliminary stage with just two minutes on the clock to progress to the quarter-final.
The Zambian bantamweight pugilist was on song as he pulled off another dominant display that saw him eliminate Bekombo Valdono of Cameroon via a technical knockout in the third round to book his place into the semi-final.
However, Ngoma could not go past William Stuart of Scotland and settled for bronze in the 56kg weight.
In the lightweight category, Nkumbu Silungwe was denied a medal after suffering defeat at the hands of Thadius Katoa of Papua New Guinea in the quarter-final.
This was after Silungwe made an impressive start with a resounding victory in the preliminary stage over Bris Payne Akubor of Nairu Islands whom he knocked out in the first minute of the first round.
Sprinter Deophister Chongo failed to beat her opponents in the 200m final race and finished in distant eighth after clocking 25.68 seconds. Nigeria’s Idamadudu Oghenefejiro (23.30 seconds) bagged gold and Scotland’s Alisha Rees walked away with silver, while Etim Alphonsus of Nigeria got a bronze medal.
Long distance runner Godfrey Chama equally had a tough time on Day Three of the Games, finishing at the tail in the 800m final with the time of 1:57:57 minutes.
The Kenyan duo of Willy Tarbei and Bett Kipyegon won gold and silver after finishing 1:46:05 and 1:46:15 respectively while Ben Greenwood of Scotland settled for bronze.
Woes for the swimming duo continued with Kumaren Naidu managing an impressive swim to finish third in the second final of the 100m breaststroke in the time of 1:10:63 minutes but his time could not beat that of Fu Kang Wong of Malaysia, who clocked 1:03:36 in the first final to scoop gold with the silver and bronze medals going to England’s Edward Baxter (1:03:72) and South Africa’s Isemonger (1:04:72) respectively.
In the women 100m breaststroke, Kasia Lewis finished at the tail.