Cuba suffered its second defeat in Olympic boxing at Paris 2024 this Wednesday, following the adverse result of Saidel Horta against Munarbek Seitbek Uulu from Kyrgyzstan, in the 57-kilogram division.
Horta, universal silver medalist in 2023, said goodbye to the competition after an unexpected situation, as a cut on his face prevented him from continuing the fight in the third and final round.
The Antillean dominated the first round, conceded in the second, and the injury caused the judges to show their scores after only a few moments of the decisive period.
Thus came the worst news: four of the five referees saw the Euroasian dominate, also third in the world, and who won the divided vote 2-3 to continue on the path to the medals.
In this way, the largest of the Antilles only has three of its fighters remaining in the competition, as Julio César la Cruz also fell in his debut against his compatriot Loren Berto Alfonso, representative of Azerbaijan.
With several days of combat remaining, Cuba will place all its hopes on Alejandro Claro (51), Erislandy Álvarez (63.5), and Arlen López, two-time Olympic champion in Rio de Janeiro 2016 and Tokyo 2020.
López seeks to become the fourth boxer capable of winning the planet's main multi-sport event three times. It is worth noting that La Cruz was pursuing the same goal, but…
The story goes that this feat has been achieved only by the Hungarian Laszlo Papp (1948, 1952, 1956) and the Cubans Teófilo Stevenson (1972, 1976, 1980) and Félix Savón (1992, 1996, 2000).
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