Revival boxer ‘flies’ into TT team

FLYWEIGHT Terrance Lokai sealed his place on the national team for the upcoming Caribbean Amateur Boxing Championships (CABA) with an impressive display in a box-off on Sunday at the Cosmic Gym in Marabella.

Lokai, a 23-year-old from the Revival Boxing Gym in Port-of-Spain, scored a huge revenge victory against Aaron Cumberbatch in a surprising one-sided contest. The Barataria fighter, a baker with Rolls at the Uptown Mall in Port-of-Spain and who is also a skilled tatooist upped his record to six wins in ten bouts with four losses. The defeats, Lokai said were all outside of Trinidad and Tobago at Caribbean Championships with the one exception being a disputed bout against Cumberbatch more than a year ago. “I thought that the decision at the 2001 National Championships in Diego Martin was not fair. Sunday’s win is all the more sweeter now,” said Lokai yesterday.

Coming out agressively on Sunday, Lokai peppered his opponent, the “Most Outstanding Boxer” at last year’s Caribbean Championship with a series of stinging left jabs forcing referee Errol Campbell to intervene with three standing eight-counts for Cumberbatch. The flurry of blows continued for the duration of the bout as Lokai, a silver medallist at last year’s regional competition in Martinique, forced Cumberbatch to retreat in a vain attempt at evasion as the Revival fighter hunted his prey relentlessly and was rewarded with an unanimous decision. Manager of Lokai, Allan Ferguson, a former national middleweight amateur champion, said the victory was not unexpected as together with head Revival coach, Rufus Edwards they have been studying the style and fight record of Cumberbatch over the past several months. “The Revival Technical Team knew everything about his way of fighting and Lokai did the job. Our boy is now certain to go to the Bahamas and we are confident that he will bring back a gold medal,” said Ferguson yesterday.

Lokai said his preparation has been hampered over the past year by the closure of the Revival Gym which was done to protest the administration of the sport in Trinidad and Tobago. “I hope to get in more glove-work and sparring within the next week to reach full fitness,” said Lokai. However he said he is coming into peak form at the moment and will be in tip-top shape just in time for the Caribbean Championships from April 20 to 27. The defeat was a letdown for Cumberbatch, gold medallist at CABA and winner of two top individual awards at the Caribbean Championships last year and who is being prepared for the World Junior Boxing Championships in Romania later this year. Lokai is slated to face his opponent again on Sunday in another box-off to ready the national boxers for the Caribbean Championships and has no qualms of a refreshed Cumberbatch, hungry to go one-up. “I am fully prepared mentally and physically for him. I will beat him again, that’s for sure,” Lokai said.