Olympic Boxing Draw: Middleweights

Quick thoughts on the Middleweight Olympic boxing draw.
Official Link to the Middleweight Draw

Middleweight (75kg / 165 lbs)
The first round of the Olympic middleweight tourney is over and we’ve already seen a rematch of a 2007 Chicago World Championship quarterfinal bout. Bronze winner Bakhtiyar Artayev from Kazakhstan began his difficult Beijing path by defeating Said Rachidi from Morroco again. The match wasn’t as high scoring as Bakhtiyar’s 19-11 defeat of Said in Chicago but the 8-2 score was just as decisive.

Next up for Artayev is 2007 gold medalist Russian Matvey Korobov who looked very good in defeating Sweden’s Terbunja Naim 18-6.

At Chicago Matvey won every match by 20+ points except for a quarterfinal win over China’s Wang Jianzheng. The score of that match: 22-3.

Korobov won’t have to face Wang in Beijing. Despite a raucous home crowd Wang dropped his match 15-6 to 2007’s other bronze winner the Ukraine’s Sergiy Derevyanchenko.

The winner of the Korobov-Artayev could face American Shawn Estrada should he defeat Great Britain’s James Degale.

The only fighter likely to challenge the 26-year old Russian is Cuban Emilio Correa who waltzed through his first round match scoring a 17-4 win over Australia’s Jarrod Fletcher. The Cuban and the Russian stand on opposite sides of the bracket and wouldn’t meet until the final.

(NOTE All Times are Eastern U.S. time)
Round of 16
Saturday, August 16
First Session 3:30 a.m. – 4:30 a.m. EST
Second Session 9:00 a.m. – 10:00 a.m. EST

Quarterfinals
Wednesday, August 20
8:00 a.m. – 9:00 a.m. EST

Semifinals
Friday, August 22
3:00 a.m. – 3:30 a.m. EST

Finals
Saturday, August 23
8:45 a.m. EST

Image Source: Newscom.com