New Delhi, April 18 -- Nikhat Zareen hasn't exactly set the ring on fire over the last two years. She recently returned with a bronze from the Asian Championships but an overwhelming loss to her nemesis, China's Wu Yu, in the semi-finals will continue to rankle. Olympic champion Wu beat her in Paris too, and it took Nikhat quite some time to recover from that setback. The Indian boxer is a class act when she finds her range, as demonstrated by winning back-to-back world titles in 2022 and 2023. Her sharp counters are difficult to handle but they come only with great control and confidence in the ring. With the Asian Games and Commonwealth Games scheduled this year, Nikhat will carry the burden of expectations and will need to reach a higher level. At the Asiad, she will have to be ready for Wu and other top boxers. Post the Paris Olympics, it has been a rough ride for her. At the World Championships last year, she lost 0-5 to Turkey's Buse Naz Cakiroglu, a two-time Olympic silver medallist, in the quarter-finals. She did well to win gold at the World Boxing Cup Finals at home, delivering a dominant performance against Chinese Taipei's Xuan Yi Guo in the final. After winning the national title, where she beat Nitu Ghanghas in the final, Nikhat chose to prepare for the Asian Championships and even skipped the Boxam International in Spain. The Asian meet in Ulaanbaatar at the start of the month was her first international competition of the season. After receiving a bye in Round 1, she had no trouble outclassing Filipino Xian Baguhin, winning by RSC to confirm her medal and a place in the semis. However, she once again failed to cross the Wu hurdle, going down 0-5, with three of the five judges scoring it 30-27 in favour of the Chinese. India coach Santiago Nieva said Nikhat had put up a strong fight against the Chinese until one solid punch rocked her. He believes she is closer than ever to solving the Wu puzzle. "Wu, the Olympic champion, hasn't lost a bout in years. In the first bout against a young Filipino boxer, Nikhat stopped her in the first round. She had a very strong first round until she got caught by one punch, and she lost the balance and got an eight count. She ended up losing the round 4-1. But in our eyes, she had won the round and was fighting really well," Nieva told HT. "Yes, the Chinese boxer stepped up in the second round, and we were not able to solve it this time. But the way Nikhat boxed in the first round gives me a lot of hope for the future. If she can manage to box three rounds like that we definitely have a strong competitive contender." Nikhat loves to fight clean from a distance. The speed of the Chinese has often caught her off guard and she was working on that aspect of her game, besides putting a good strategy in place to tackle her. Nieva feels not only Nikhat, but many of the bouts of Indian women boxers become messy with a lot of clinching and holding. "They're not able to show their best boxing as they do in sparring or in other bouts where they dominate. One of the things I'm trying to teach them is how to avoid ending up in those situations or how to deal with the situations so that they can spend more time boxing and less time wrestling. I'd say we have seen a clear improvement but sometimes with the tension and the nerves and with some opponents it is very rough. We need to be able to be in control in basically at all times in any situation during the bout. When you lose control it becomes a toss up who will win the bout," Nieva added. The first challenge for Nikhat will be to top the assessment in the national camp in May to get into the CWG and Asiad teams. World champion in 48kg Minakshi Hooda, who won gold in the Asian meet, could also go up in 51kg to try her luck. "There's nothing in 48kg the rest of the year. She's obviously light in the weight, she's performed incredible in 48kg and I'd like to see her at 51kg. If she can perform the way she's doing at 48, she will be very dangerous for anyone," says Nieva. It will be exciting to keep an eye on as the competition unfolds to book berths for the Asian Games and CWG. Nikhat will be up for the challenge but so will the rest of the field....