Ilongga boxer Irish Magno marches to SEAG women’s boxing gold medal match

By Leobert Julian A. de la Peña

Ilongga boxer Irish Magno already assured the Philippines of either a silver or a gold medal in the ongoing 2023 Southeast Asian Games held at the Hall G of the Chroy Changvar Convention Center in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

The native of Janiuay, Iloilo kept her SEAG campaign alive after beating Novita Sinadia of Indonesia during the semifinal round of the women’s 54-kg category last May 9, 2023.

Magno displayed an efficient striking clinic on Sinadia to grab a convincing 5-0 unanimous decision victory and will look to continue her stellar performance on May 13, 2023, in the grand finals round.

The superstar boxer will be squaring off against a familiar nemesis, Jutamas Jitpong of Thailand, for the gold medal match.

Magno and Jitpong already traded blows during the last edition of the Olympics at Tokyo where the Thai got the better of the Filipina in the second round of the tournament.

Although Magno was the aggressor in the fight, Jitpong’s reach advantage played a huge part in her victory as she just connected on more punches.

In the three rounds of the fight, Magno wasn’t able to find and cut the distance to land more punches and negate the reach factor that the Thai had.

Magno needed a huge third round to take control of the scorecards but Jitpong chose to play safe and used her reach advantage again to throw more effective jabs.

Aside from Magno, Nesthy Petecio, the Tokyo Olympic silver medalist, will also seek to win a gold medal after advancing to the grand finals round of the women’s featherweight division.

Petecio dominated Cambodia’s Vy Sreysros and pulled off a 5-0 win to set up a highly-anticipated gold medal showdown against Ratna Sari Devi of Indonesia.