Kazakhstan's Sapiyev wins welterweight gold

Kazakhstan's Serik Sapiyev won the men's Olympic welterweight gold on Sunday with a crushing 17-9 win over Britain's Freddie Evans, making up for his shattering quarter-final loss four years ago.

Evans, the European champion, failed to cope with the impressive workrate of Sapiyev, who worked his jab throughout the three rounds and never let the Briton find his range.

Having taken the first round 4-2, Sapiyev consolidated his lead by winning the second 6-3.

At 10-5 down going into the third round, Evans started taking risks looking for a big punch, but Sapiyev's guard was solid and he underlined his domination of the Welshman by taking the third round 7-4 to earn the gold.

"I am very glad to be here, this victory is for the whole of Kazakhstan," said Sapiyev, who added Olympic gold to the world silver medal he won last year.

"I have been waiting for this moment so long. In Beijing, I lost in the quarter-finals and I was upset, but I was dreaming about the next Olympics."

By taking silver, Evans claimed Britain's fourth boxing medal of the London Games after bantamweight Luke Campbell and flyweiht Nicola Adams both took golds and Anthony Ogogo finished with bronze in the middleweight division.

"I beat the Ukraine world champion, the number one in the world, I've had four hard fights," said Evans, who beat Ukrainian world champion Taras Shelestyuk in the semi-finals.

"That was my fifth, but he was sharper today and obviously he came out on top.

"I'm still young -- I'm only 21, I'm one of the youngest seniors here so I've done well obviously, and I'm over the moon getting to the final."

Having lost in the semi-finals, Ukraine's Taras Shelestyuk and Russia's Andrey Zamkovoy won bronze medals.

 

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