Cruz enters taek’do semis

Six-time Southeast Asian Games finweight gold medalist Roberto Cruz swept his two senior men’s matches yesterday to barge into the semifinals at the start of the Samsung Best of the Best taekwondo championships at the Glorietta in Makati City.

Cruz, 30, crushed Mandy del Rosario, 6-0, with swift, strong sidekicks to the body in the second round, and then used the same weapon to beat Letran’s Hector Arellano, 4-0, in their quarterfinal clash.

Another national jin, bantamweight JR Rivero, shared the day’s honors with Cruz by producing the fastest victory — a 30-second knockout of Baguio’s Gilbert Labio in the quarterfinals.

Rivero, 21-year-old KL SEAG bronze medalist, felled Labio with a slide back counter roundhouse kick to the face, to arrange a semifinal meeting with former national junior pool members Andre Alfie Ablaza of DLSU Taft.

Also making it to the semifinals of the tourney sponsored by Samsung, managed by IMG and supported by Accel, Colours, Philippine Star, Kix, Ayala Center and 103.5 K Lite were finweight Michael Velo of Baguio, Carlos Padilla (SBC) and Michael Buliyat (Baguio), flyweight Ostacio Soliven (Pangasinan), Reymar Aringo (Laguna), Danrey Velo (Baguio) and Arnold Oglayon (Baguio).

Michael Velo whipped Marlon Ventura, 7-1; Padilla beat UST’s Terrence Boteja, 5-2; Buliyat nipped Eugene Patagan, 2-1; Soliven won by default over National Jun Tshomlee Go, who failed to make it due to this studies; Aringo toppled AUF’s Mark Francis Aclao, 4-2; Danrey Velo ripped SBC’s Bryan Alair 3-1; Oglayon foiled Letran’s Rommel Roa, 5-3; and Ablaza topped Baguio’s Michael Lemon, 3-1.

Action continues today with senior women jins seeing action from the elimination to the final rounds, while senior men’s semifinalists continue their battle for the golds.