Rio -- Indian boxer Manoj Kumar stunned London Olympics bronze-medallist Evaldas Petrauskas in a fiercely-contested opening bout to enter the pre-quarterfinals of the 64kg category.
Manoj, a Commonwealth Games gold-medalist, prevailed 2-1 in a hard-fought battle in which he had to hold his ground against the intense aggression displayed by the Lithuanian Petrauskas in all three rounds. Manoj will next be up against the fifth-seeded Uzbek Fazliddin Gaibnazarov in the pre-quarters, scheduled for Sunday.
Evenly-matched on pace and agility, Manoj and Petrauskas were quite distinct in their attacking approach. While Petrauskas, the London Olympics bronze winner in the lightweight 60kg division, aggressively tried to engage the Indian from close range, Manoj preferred to back-peddle and hit from a distance.
"You don't get time to think as much in the ring," Manoj said after the bout. "I was responding to his punching style in the ring, you have to adapt your strategy to how your opponent in the ring is boxing."
At the end of the opening three minutes, it was Manoj's tactics that found favour with the judges, who awarded the first round to him.
In the second round, too, Petrauskas was the more aggressive of the two but Manoj managed to stave off the challenge by sticking to his strategy of keeping a distance and hitting occasional uppercuts to his opponent's body.
Neither of the boxers were willing to make any change to their strategy in the final three minutes as well, although the desperate attacks launched by Petrauskas did unnerve Manoj to an extent.
The pumped-up effort secured Petrauskas the final round, but it was not enough to turn the bout in his favour as Manoj was adjudged the winner.
"I was happy to have pulled the bout off. I knew he was a hard opponent but I hadn't spent much time studying him," Manoj said. "I prefer not to do too much tactical planning away from the ring because if it doesn't come off you aren't sure how to respond. So it is best to leave it to the ring.
"I am confident that the hard work I have put in all these years will work in my favour at the Olympics."
The win meant Manoj joined seventh-seed Vikas Krishan (75kg) as the second Indian boxers in the pre-quarters. On Thursday, Shiva Thapa will open his campaign in the bantamweight (56kg) category.