Boxers Lovlina, Sonia, Himanshu, Ashish enter Ulaanbaatar Cup semis

Ulaanbaatar, June 21: Indian boxers Sonia Lather (57kg) and Lovlina Borgohain (69kg) assured themselves of a medal after advancing to the semi-finals of the Ulaanbaatar Cup here on Thursday.

Sonia, a World and Asian championship silver-medallist, produced an assured performance to defeat local favourite Myagmar Gundegmaa to make the last-four stage.

Joining her in the medal rounds was Assam girl Lovlina, a gold-medallist at the inaugural India Open earlier this year. She was equally dominating in her 5-0 win over Thailand's Suchada Panich.

However, world silver-medallist Sarjubala Devi (51kg) bowed out in the quarterfinal stage after losing a close bout to Mongolian Myagmardulam Nandinsetseg 1-4.

Among the men boxers, Himanshu Sharma (49kg) and Ashish (64kg) also reached the last four in their respective catagories.

Himanshu beat Po Wei Tu from Chinese Taipei in a unanimous verdict before Ashish too made his way to the last four with a 5-0 win over South Korea's Kim Song Yun in a clinical performance.

Earlier on Wednesday, world and Asian medallist Shiva Thapa (60kg), former Commonwealth Games silver medallist Mandeep Jangra (69kg), Salman Sheikh (52kg) and Etash Khan (56kg) had booked their quarter-final berths.

They will be seen in action on Friday.