THURSDAY, March 28, 2024
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New Lumpini boxing stadium reopens with match on Saturday

New Lumpini boxing stadium reopens with match on Saturday

Lumpini boxing stadium will reopen on Saturday (March 13) under a new name, the Army announced on Thursday.

The Bangkok stadium will relaunch as the Royal Thai Army Sports Development Centre (Lumpini Muay Thai Centre). The Army-run sports facility has been upgraded with an exercise area for soldiers and the general public, a competition stadium, muay Thai school, and muay Thai museum for both Thais and foreigners, said Army spokesman Santipong Thammapiya.

Boxing tournaments at the stadium will be held without spectators to comply with the government’s Covid-19 restrictions. The tournaments will be broadcast live online and on the Army’s Channel 5 TV station every Tuesday and Friday from 8.30pm to 10.30pm and Saturday from 2pm-4pm. PPTV channel will also broadcast the fights live on Saturday from 4pm-6 pm.

The first boxing matches at the reopened stadium will be televised on PPTV from 4 pm-6pm this Saturday.

Lumpini Boxing stadium was closed on March 14 last year after a tournament with around 2,500 spectators generated one of the largest Covid-19 cluster infections seen in Thailand. The Army general in charge of the stadium was transferred for allowing the event to go ahead in defiance of disease-control restrictions.

The stadium was closed during the second-wave virus outbreak beginning mid-December before restrictions were lifted on March 1.

Changes at the stadium are also part of a major overhaul of Army recreational facilities ordered after the mass shooting by a soldier in Nakhon Ratchasima last year. The shooting, by a soldier disgruntled over a barracks business deal gone sour, claimed 31 lives.

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