Rey Saludar, Charly Suarez settle for silvers

ALMATY, Kazakhstan—Rey Saludar and Charly Suarez of Team PLDT-Abap dropped their final bouts Sunday and settled for silver medals in the President’s Cup here.

Suarez decked Asian lightweight champion Berik Abdrahmanov with a right hook, but failed to finish off the Kazakh in the third round despite landing a torrent of blows.

Surprisingly, however, Suarez lost by unanimous decision, with the Russian judge scoring it 29-28 and the two others, one from Ukraine  and the other from Kazakhstan, both coming up with 30-27 verdicts.

Saludar looked like he had also outpunched Uzbek Zoirov but bowed by unanimous decision, 30-26, 30-27 and 30-27.

“That (final) bell rang suspiciously early,” said national coach Elmer Pamisa, referring to Suarez’s bout. “We never even heard the 10-second clapper to signify that the round was about to end.”