KARACHI:
The most surprising performance for Pakistan came from young boxer Ilyas Hussain as he booked his place in the bantamweight quarterfinals of the 2022 Commonwealth Games with a victory against Anthony Shawn Joseph of Trinidad and Tobago in Birmingham.
Ilyas beat Jospeh 3-2.
The 22-year-old was also the first athlete to register a win for Pakistan at the Games, when athletes in boxing, swimming, cricket, hockey, badminton, gymnastics and everything in squash, barring Nasir Iqbal, failed to even get past their first opponents . in their respective competitions.
“I am happy with my performance so far,” Ilays told The Express Tribune after his bout. “This is my first international event and I feel honored to be here with all my old colleagues. I really pushed hard for this fight against Joseph. I did my best to win.”
Ilays beat Lesotho’s Moroke Mokhote by knockout before, but he believes the only thing that drives him to do better is his love for the country.
“I am doing my best, we are all doing our best and I can say that this is all for our country. I really don’t want anything for myself. I just want to win for Pakistan”, reflected the boxer from Quetta.
He belongs to Quetta’s Hazara community, which has been persecuted for decades for its faith and ethnicity and has produced talented boxers and karatekas for Pakistan.
Ilays said he lives in Hazara city and started boxing in 2016 at a local club with trainer Najeeb Faizi. Faizi has supported and mentored him, while it is his father who wanted him to take up this sport seriously.
“It has been a difficult journey. My father has supported me, the coach too and my elder brother also boxes well, but he is not in any department yet,” said Ilyas, who plays for Army in indoor events.
He was discovered two years ago when he competed in the national competition for U22 boxers and went on to win the national featherweight title twice.
But being in Birmingham and seeing the international standards makes the young man feel that he is missing a lot at home when it comes to facilities and opportunities.
“The boxers here are so good and so skilled,” Ilyas said with a childlike innocence. “I have not seen such objects before. I can tell that these boxers have a lot more to train. We don’t even get 40 percent of what these boxers in other countries have in training, facilities and diet.”
Ilyas trains for at least six hours a day, he said, but after returning from the Games, he wants to improve his training and put in an extra effort.
Ilyas thinks that his objective is the Olympics in the long term and for now he will give everything to win a medal.
He added that so far he is happy to have made his family proud with his performance so far in the Commonwealth Games.
“They are very happy and that makes a big difference. I’m happy to have made them proud,” said Ilays, further revealing that his favorite boxer is Mexican Canelo Alvarez. He added that he looks up to army coach and former Pakistani boxer Ahmed Ali, who competed in the 2004 Olympics.
Ilyas feels that his next match against Northern Ireland’s Jude Gallagher will be a tough one and he wants to make sure he delivers his best counter attack, which he feels most confident with.
Coach Arshad Hussain, who was at the national camp and with the boxers in Birmingham, believes that the next match is crucial, but there is a chance that Ilyas will win.
“He can do it. I feel his morale is very high and he is in good shape mentally and physically,” said Arshad.
Meanwhile, the other Pakistani coach who was also in the camp but was not selected to go to Birmingham, Tariq Siddique, said that Ilyas has done a very good job so far.
“The competition is fierce. When we look at Indian boxers, they have trained abroad, but our boxers have not. There is a big difference, however, Ilyas has been very lively in his two fights,” said Siddique, who also coached Pakistan’s first World Boxing Council champion Muhammad Waseem.
“The next match will be difficult for him and he needs to implement a good strategy to win those three rounds.”
