Joyce misses out on team for world championships

THREE European championship medallists, one of whom is an Olympian, and two national champions have missed out as the Irish team that departs today for a training camp ahead of next month’s world amateur boxing championships in Milan was named.

The team was due to be released last week but that was postponed, so tight were the margins in some instances. In the end, head coach Billy Walsh gave his recommendations to the IABA central council, which ratified the team last night.

Amongst the high-profile omissions was John Joe Joyce, who only lost to the subsequent gold medallist at last year’s Olympics and was one of Ireland’s three bronze medal winners at the European Championships.

He was well beaten by Philip Sutcliffe in the national championships however and the Crumlin fighter has confirmed his superiority since.

Ross Hickey and Eamon O’Kane completed the European Championship tally but neither made what must be considered the strongest team to leave these shores for any major championships in any sport.

Hickey lost his national title to Eric Donovan, Donovan got the nod and takes over the captaincy for his third world championships.

Darren O’Neill’s selection at middleweight was a formality despite O’Kane’s heroics last year and the Paulstown powerhouse is tipped to prosper now that Darren Sutherland has moved on to the paid ranks.

The two national titleholders to miss out are featherweight kingpin Carl Frampton, to EU gold medallist David Oliver Joyce, and David Joyce at super heavyweight, to Cathal McMonagle from Holy Trinity.

McMonagle is joined by clubmate and defending world bronze medallist Paddy Barnes, as well as fellow Donegal man Willie McLaughlin from Illies Golden Gloves.

Cavan Olympian John Joe Nevin, Declan Geraghty, Con Sheehan from Clonmel and Olympic silver medallist Kenny Egan complete the team.

IABA president Dom O’Rourke confirmed that it was “a tough process” to select the team.

“We could have selected another two teams to go to the world championships. That’s the strength in depth we have at the moment.”

Billy Walsh explained that the five competitions and three training camps that had taken place since the national championships in March had been the determining factors but said there were a lot of close calls.

“Ireland is not an easy draw anymore” said Walsh. “Now they fear us. We had Uzbekistan come here to see what we do. They asked us in Turkey. They came here and they loved it. They thought we were animals.”