Walsh says Ward a big threat to Egan title hopes

KENNY EGAN may have an Olympic silver medal but Ireland’s most decorated boxer of thisgeneration will face a difficultassignment in his quest for asensational 11th successive national senior title.

That’s according to Ireland’s High Performance Coach, Billy Walsh, who sees the Moate teenager, Joe Ward, putting forward a huge challenge to the Neilstown southpaw when the national senior championships get under way. The championships will be boxed over three weekends in February with the finals on February 25.

For the past couple of years another world youth medallist, Tommy McCarthy from Belfast, has been putting it up to Egan in national finals — moving a point or two closer each time without really threatening the dominance of the Dubliner.

But Walsh feels that Ward will not show Egan as much respect if and when they touch gloves in the senior championships.

“Joe Ward is a two-time world champion at under-age level so he has a lot of confidence as well as a lot of class,” he said.

“Kenny is in superb shape over in Miami at the moment and it is going to take a world class performance to take him on never mind to beat him. But in his division we now have two other world class performers in Tommy McCarthy and Joe Ward.”

Lady Luck deprived Ward of the gold medal at last year’s Youth Olympics in Singapore where Ryan Burnett won the light flyweight title. After winning gold at the world youths championships earlier in the year in Baku he travelled as hot favourite for the middleweight title but broke his hand early in his bout against Damien Hooper from Australia — and still only lost 4-2.

It was galling on account of the fact that he had beaten Hooper 6-1 in the finals of the world youth championships.

That injury kept him out of action for a short time and on December 17 he returned to Baku, moved up to light heavyweight and beat a very good Russian, Vladimir Korshunov, for the gold medal in his first multi nations tournament.

“Kenny (Egan) will certainly face his biggest ever home challenge,” Walsh said.

“He is in the best form he has ever been in and that quest for an 11th national senior title will drive him on.

” I remember thinking when JimO’Sullivan won his 10 national senior title that the achievement would never be repeated. I know, I fought in ten senior finals myself but I thought that with so many youngsters coming through and the sport itself demanding so much sacrifice and dedication lads would not enjoy the same longevity. But Kenny has defied all the odds.

“This year is different to any other in that it is the start of the Olympic qualifiers. We have the world championships in September but qualification for Irish boxers starts with the national championships because to qualify you are going to have to win an Irish title and that is not going to be easy with so much talent in every single division.

“We have Olympic, world, European, Commonwealth and European Union medallists in so many divisions. This year we won five medals at the European championships, five at the Commonwealth Games and then there were world and European under-age medals as well.

“Paddy Barnes is probably the best in the world at his weight and he is still very young. He is heading in the right direction towards London 2012.”

Darren O’Neill has grown in stature and confidence since winning a silver medal at the European championships in Moscow where every one of his fights was a war of attrition.

The Paulstown southpaw, who has been plagued by injury in the past, is enjoying his longest ever injury-free stretch. Like all of the other members of the High Performance squad he is back with his club preparing for the championships under the watchful eye of his father, Ollie, who lost a senior final himself to Sammy Storey and doubles up as a GAA referee.

Darren O’Neill lost three senior finals to Kenny Egan and two to the late Darren Southerland and had the disappointment of watching three boxers he had beaten previously win Olympic medals in Beijing.

Bring in the likes of Ross Hickey, Philip Sutcliffe, Ray Moylette, David Oliver Joyce, John Joe Joyce, Tyrone McCullough, John Joe Nevin and Roy Sheahan and one can see why the upcoming national senior championships will be special.