In a keenly-contested quarterfinal, Karthik, the defending champion, used his experience to good use to notch a smart win at the Sree Kanteerava Indoor stadium.
Kishore opted a defensive approach early on, occasionally trying to surprise Karthik with his better reach. However, the bout picked up in intensity in the second round with Kishore going on the attack. Stung by the assault, Karthik, cheered on by his Madras Engineer Group mates, bounced back in style to corner Kishore. With the bout hanging in the balance, both went for broke in the third and final round, where the 20-year-old Karthik outsmarted his opponent with his swiftness.
Results (quarterfinals, Karnataka unless stated): 48KG: Shainish (A&N) w/o Prabu (TN), Pradeep Singh (Ker) bt R Babu (AP) by points.
51KG: Sanjay Kolte (TN) bt P Raghuvaran (Pud) by points.
54KG: Santosh Ku (A&N) bt R Rajesh (Pud) by points, Raj Kumar bt Rajesh (AP) retd, M Rahman bt Herojeet Singh (Ker) by points.
57KG: Rojit Kumar bt S Gopi (TN) by points, CK Reddy (AP) bt L Manikanan (Pud) by points, Pritam Sahu (Ker) bt Vincent Paul by points.
60KG: M Karthik bt C Kishore by points, K Surender bt Kumar (Pud), Saravanan bt K Dinesh by points.
64KG: V Santosh bt Satyanarayan (Ker) by points. Anil w/o D Gunashankaran (TN), Arjun (Pud) bt V Vijay (A&N) by KO.
69KG: Sagesh (TN) bt S Madhu Sudhanan (Pud) by points, G Vivek bt Syed Mansoor (Ker) by points.
75KG: Karthikeyan (TN) bt Ganesh (Pud) by points, Sunil Olla (A&N) w/o Raj Kumar, M Govind Raj bt V Naresh (AP) by points.
81KG: Prasant Patil bt Vijay Bharat by points, D Vinath (Pud) bt Manoj Parvhaker retd.
91KG: Sharanyan (Ker) bt Nagababu (AP) RSC, Sunil bt Udayan RSC.
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