Jitender Kumar follows Akhil Kumar's route

India's Jitender Kumar lost to Russian pugilist Georgy Balakshin in the 51kg flyweight category in the Olympics boxing competition on Wednesday.

The Indian boxer lost the bout 15-11 at the Workers' Gymnasium to end hopes of a medal. If Jitender had won he would have been assured of at least a bronze medal.

Though Jitender began on an aggressive note throwing away punches but failed to connect most of them as the Russian took a lead of 2-1 in the first round.

In second round both the boxers scored five points each but thanks to the one-point lead from the first round, Balakshin maintained the lead 7-6.

However, Jitender was totally outclassed in the third round as a flurry of punches from the Russian earned him as many as six points against only two for the Indian. The Russian pulled clear in the third, taking a 13-8 lead.

Jitender could not make up for the lost ground as the Russian resorted to defensive tactics, making scoring very difficult for his opponent in the last round. The Indian although reduced the margin in the fourth and final round when the referee awarded him an extra point to counter the Russian's negative tactics making it 3-2 in his favour. But that made little difference to the result. The Russian eventually won 15-11.

Here were scores for each round - Russian : Indian

Round 1 2:1
Round 2 5:5
Round 3 6:2
Round 4 2:3

The Asian Championship bronze medallist had defeated Uzbek rival Tulashboy Doniyorov by 13-6 in the pre-quarter-finals on Saturday.

Earlier, Jitender, making his Olympic debut, had pummelled his Turkish opponent Ulas Furkan Memis in less than three rounds in the opening round.