New Delhi: Indian boxing contingent was surrounded by controversies in the recently concluded London Olympics and most of the boxers felt cheated in the way they were beaten. Manoj Kumar who was involved in a controversial bout against home favorite George Stalker said that it was the refereeing that cost him the match because in his mind he was always the winner.

“According to me I was winning from the first bout, I was hitting some good punches, but soon I realized that I was not getting points and I knew that no matter what I do, I will lose the match.”

Manoj Kumar won the third bout 7-4 but lost the match 16-20.

“In the middle of the match I got the feeling that I will lose because I was not getting the points for the shots, but that didn’t stop me from hitting my opponent because I wanted to show the world that there is something wrong that is going around here. After the match I got more applause than my opponent and that showed that even the audience knew that I should have won the match.”

There were several complaints launched by the Indian boxing contingent but to no avail on that Manoj said, “It is a fact that the countries who have a high number of participants, only their complaint is registered. Our contingent of 81 athletes was nothing in comparison to the countries which had 500 or 300 athletes.”

National coach GS Sandhu also said that Indian boxers did not get the result they deserved.

“Yes, there was some controversial decisions made against our boxers. Even the coaches and players from different countries came to me and said that Indian boxers were good and they were hard done. AIBA is going to change the scoring system and that itself proves that there were some mistakes that were made.