Rio de Janeiro: Former Asian Games gold medallist Vikas Krishan (75kg) gave a perfect start to India's boxing campaign in the Olympics as he outwitted American greenhorn Charles Conwell to enter the pre-quarterfinals here.
The 24-year-old Vikas defeated the Olympic debutant 3-0 in his opening contest, which came alive only in the final three minutes, to make the last-16.
The 18-year-old Conwell, who walked in to hostile boos from the local crowd, struggled to launch an attack on the Indian in the opening round. Vikas, on the other hand, used his right straights and uppercuts to good effect in the first three minutes.
Vikas dropped his guard quite early in the bout but Conwell's attempts at capitalising on it did not quite work out as he landed into a well-laid trap by the counter-attacking Indian.
Vikas seemed more assured in the second round and concentrated on breaking down Conwell's defence by targeting his torso.
Although the judges were divided in awarding the round to the former World Championships bronze-medallist, Vikas had done enough to secure himself the handy lead going into the final round.
After being seemingly clueless and fetching two cautions for bending excessively in the first two rounds, Conwell gathered himself in the final three minutes to land a couple of crisp jabs but the effort came too late in the day.
The final round ended up being tied between the two boxers but Vikas emerged triumphant on the back of his strong showing in the first two rounds.
Vikas said he wanted to land clear punches and impress the judges to seal the bout against Conwell in the first two rounds so as to avoid a repeat of the London Olympics.
He had won against American Errol Spence in the prequarters but the decision was overturned after a protest four years ago.
"When I saw the draw and got a fight against another US boxer, the London thought came to my mind. I did not want a repeat of what happened four years back. But I had my strategies clear -- to beat him in the first two rounds," he said.
"I wanted to hit clean punches so it's seen for all the five judges and kill the element of doubt. Exchanges were normal but my blows were clean," Vikas added.
Both the boxers have a common link as Vikas has trained under Conwell's present coach Willie Moses.
"This boxer was completely new to me. I never met him either at the World Cup or the World Championships. So the idea was to watch him properly in the first round and try to inflict two to four sharp blows to get the attention of the judges," he said.
"He is a youngster and was relying more on power while I played with my experience. I knew he's young and athletic so I tried to maintain a bit of distance," he added.
National coach Gurbax Singh Sandhu hoped all the three boxers would do well.
"He was trying to play rough and in the close range. We wanted to keep him at a distance and make some uppercuts. It was total domination, the second round was close but we still dominated. We wanted to save ourselves in the third round," he said.
Manoj Kumar (64kg) will begin his campaign tomorrow, followed by Shiva Thapa (56kg) on Thursday.
