Pertina has yet to prepare boxers for President Cup

JAKARTA (JP): The Indonesian Amateur Boxing Association (Pertina) deputy secretary general Didit Soedijoto said Friday that the organization had yet to prepare its boxers to compete in the President Cup in Bali by the end of this month.

"The boxers just joined the centralized training program today as some of them are still in their hometowns after competing in the 15th National Games (in Surabaya last month). We have only three weeks to prepare them while other countries have groomed their boxers since three months ago," he said, as quoted by Antara.

Didit expressed concern that national boxers, who were selected for PON, would not reach their peak performance in the July 27 to Aug. 3 event.

One hundred and 53 boxers from 21 countries have confirmed their participation in the event. Some of them are Olympic qualifiers.

"We don't have high expectations of becoming the overall champion in the President Cup this year. Hosting the event successfully is our primary target," Didit said.

However, Pertina still expects national boxers to perform their best and avoid losing by KOs (knockouts) or RSCs (Referee Stops Contest) in early rounds.

"We hope there are national boxers who reach the finals," he said, adding that chef de mission Dali Sofari has responsibility for our national boxers success.

The President Cup was scheduled to take place in 1998 but due to the political situation at that time, Pertina delayed hosting the event until this year.

"This is the deadline for holding the President Cup. Had we failed, the event would have been dropped from the International Amateur Boxing Association (AIBA) calendar," Didit said.

Pertina has asked AIBA to assign at least 25 referees to control 27 daily qualifying matches.

Didit estimated the number of boxers would increase several days prior to the event as the Philippines, South Korea, Singapore, Uzbekistan, Canada and the Netherlands have yet to inform the number of their boxers.

"I'm sure the number of boxers will reach 200 and it will be the biggest event since the first one staged 18 years ago."

Besides the six countries mentioned above and host Indonesia, Japan, England, India, Germany, Malaysia, Iran, Brunei Darussalam, Australia, China, Laos, Thailand, Italy, Sri Lanka, Mauritius, New Zealand, Nepal, Algeria and Myanmar have confirmed their participation in the event. (yan)