History has been made at the Olympics!! 20-year-old Samuel Takyi wins Ghana’s first Olympic medal for the first time in 29 years. This is Ghana’s first Olympic medal since 1992 when the national team won bronze at the 1992 Olympic Games in Barcelona, Spain. It is also the first boxing medal won by a Ghanaian boxer since 1972 when middleweight Prince Amartey won bronze at the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich, Germany. The 20-year-old Ghanaian boxer came from behind to defeat 32-year-old Colombian fighter David Ceiber Avila in the quarter-final securing a semi-final fight against the United States’ Ragan Duke. Samuel Takyi win against David Ceiber Avila means he has already won a bronze medal going into the semi-final. It took Samuel Takyi two of the three rounds to knock out David Ceiber Avila.
The 20-year-old Samuel Takyi has made himself a name in Ghana’s history books as the fourth fighter to win an Olympic medal (Clement Quartey won a silver medal at the 1960 Olympic games in Rome, Italy – Eddie Blay won a bronze at the 1964 Olympic Games in Tokyo, Japan – Prince Amartey won a bronze at the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich, Germany). Samuel Takyi’s victory against the experienced Colombian fighter David Ceiber Avila didn’t come easy. The Colombian fighter landed ruthless punches on Samuel Takyi in the first round, which he won. In the second and third round, the ancestors came through and Samuel Takyi went ballistic on the far more experienced Colombian fighter which gave Takyi a 3-2 win against the Colombian.
Born in 2000, in Ghana, Takyi was a football player before he became a boxer. Takyi loved playing football but the 20-year-old decided to take up another sporting discipline, boxing, which he suddenly fell in love with. His next fight versus Duke Ragan is on Tuesday, August 3, 11:30 AM JST (that’s 2:30 AM Ghana time).
