ACCRA 2023: WORLD HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPION, KHADIJA LEAD MOROCCO BOXING TEAM TO 13TH AFRICAN GAMES

World heavyweight champion Khadija Mardi will lead the Moroccan boxing team to defend their title at the 13th African Games in Accra-Ghana.

Mardi is part of the 10 boxers made up of five men and five women – selected by The Royal Moroccan Boxing Federation for the Accra 2023 Games.

Morocco are currently the defending African Games champions. They clinched the overall team title at the 2019 African Games at home in Rabat with four gold, two silver and one bronze medal.

According to Nabil Hilmi, who is with the boxing team as a manager in Italy, said Mardi will captain the African Games team.

“Currently they’re all preparing in Istanbul for the African Games and the Olympic Qualifiers,” said Hilmi who also managed Morocco’s successful team which won the Africa Championships last year in Yaounde, Cameroon.

Mardi, one of Morocco’s most decorated boxers, won middleweight gold medal at the 2019 African Games in Rabat, defeating Rady Gramane of Mozambique whom she beat again in last year’s Africa Olympic Qualifiers in Dakar, Senegal.
She is the only Rabat 2019 gold medallist in Morocco’s boxing team for the African games in Accra.

Meanwhile, other Rabat 2019 medallists going to the African games are Africa minimumweight champion and bronze medallist in the World Championships Yasmine Mouttaki and welterweight boxer Oumayma Bel Ahbib. Mouttaki won silver in the flyweight division with Oumayma wining bronze in the welterweight division at the 2019 Games.

Decorated Africa bantamweight champion Widad Bertal is also in the star-studded women’s line-up for the Accra games. Bertal, Mouttaki and Mardi have already qualified for the Paris 2024 Olympics games.

Also in the team is 2022 Africa light-middleweight gold medallist Hamza El Barbari.

The boxing team made up of seven men and three women are at the moment in Italy for the World Olympic Qualifiers.

Here are the names of boxers who will represent Morocco at the African Game in Accra;

Men:
Essaadi Hamza 48kg
Imad Azoui 54kg
Berchami Mehdi 63.5kg
El Barbari Hamza 71kg
ElOuarz Yassine 75kg

Women:
Mouttaki Yasmine 50kg
Cheddar Rabab 52kg
Bertal Widad 54kg
Bel Ahbib Oumayma 66kg
Mardi Khadija 81kg

Kyei Manu

I’m a Practicing Media Personnel /Freelance Journalist. The Editor/Blogger of this portal, with interest in Sports, Environmental and other Social issues that affects society.
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