Irish 10 fighting to double up in Baku

A 10-STRONG Irish team will be amongst the record entry of 685 boxers from 127 nations competing at the world championships in the Azerbaijani capital Baku over the coming week.

World titles aren’t the only issue at stake, with 92 Olympic places up for grabs for the top eight in eight of the 10 weight divisions.

But there are other scenarios where boxers can secure passage to London. For the heavyweights and super heavyweights the four semi-finalists are assured of progress. In those divisions the two quarter-finalists who lose to eventual finalists qualify, while in the other weights the two boxers beaten in the last 16 by the two finalists will also go through.

Olympic silver medallist Kenny Egan has been to six world championships and has never managed a podium finish. Egan has moved up to heavyweight since a shock defeat by Moate teenager Joe Ward in the national light heavyweight final last February and wants to tick two boxes this week — a world championship medal and a place on the plane to London in 2012.

Egan said: “All the emphasis is on qualifying for London but that’s next year and I’m only thinking about the world championships next week. I want to try and get on that podium. Everything is going great.

“We have had some good sparring in Cologne. The Germans were there, Moldova, Romania — good squads and plenty of sparring and that’s what we wanted. The hard work was done before we went out there. This was just the sharp stuff.”

He took an 11-6 drubbing from Ward in the senior championships and received another wake-up call from Antrim’s Stephen Ward in the recent unseeded tournament, which indicated he may have a problem with the bigger opponents he will meet in Baku. But Egan is in confident form.

“I’m going to rely on my speed — a lot of feinting and stuff like that — it will stand to me,” he countered.

“That’s what amateur boxing is all about — getting in there and getting points and getting back out of there just as quickly. I’m in much better shape than I was in for the box-offs. I’m flying and I’m confident. I’ll go out there and, hopefully, secure my place for London. That’ll be the icing on the cake.”

He comes off an exciting year both with Miami in the inaugural World Series of Boxing and with Ireland on the international scene, notching up nine victories to just three losses.

Olympic bronze medallist Paddy Barnes enters the worlds with just one contest behind him this year, the 9-1 victory over Evan Metcalfe (Crumlin) to retain his national senior title.

He was an unlikely Olympic qualifier at the world championships in Chicago four years ago, having been a surprise addition to the squad, and went onto win a bronze medal in Beijing. Since then he won gold at last year’s European championships and the Commonwealth Games in Delhi but missed the Europeans through injury.

“This will be my first competition this year but I don’t see that as a problem,” he said. “I don’t see it as being bad for me in any way because last year — five weeks before the European championships — I had a hernia operation and the Europeans were my first competition and I went on to win the gold medal. I had a couple of months break with no competition and I went straight to the Commonwealth Games and I won a gold medal there.

“Even in my own club I spar the likes of Ryan Burnett, Aidan Walsh, Tyrone McCullagh and female international Michaela Walsh. They are all world-class boxers so I don’t have to walk outside the gym door to get world-class sparring.”