John Joe believes he can go higher
Nevin and Campbell have slugged it out before and the Mullingar man won that contest handsomely — 13-2 — but he is the first to admit a lot of punches have been thrown since that confrontation at the European Union Championships in Denmark in 2009.
“He has improved a lot since then and so have I. One thing I can promise, this will be a good fight, it will be a very tough fight and I’ll be up for it,” said Cavan BC fighter Nevin, who beat Orzubek Shayimov of Uzbekistan in the quarter-final.
Hull native Campbell won what was a rare gold medal for England at the European Championships in Liverpool back in 2008, when Nevin was taking a break after his first Olympics.
“I have qualified for the Olympics and I know I have a bronze medal and I am very proud of that,” Nevin said. “But there is more to come. I am looking forward to this fight and I want to make the final.”
High Performance Unit coach Billy Walsh, who also saw Darren O’Neill and Michael Conlan qualify for the London Olympics this week, insists Nevin has the ammunition to fulfil his dream.
“He has a hard campaign out here but he is in super shape and, like all the other boxers, he will leave absolutely nothing behind him in that ring,” he said.
“This has been a great week for us and I am very proud of every one of those boys and what they have achieved. We came out here with a target of three Olympic qualifiers and one medal and we have reached that now.
“I won’t be surprised if we have a fourth qualifier from these championships because if the Latvian who beat Roy Sheahan gets into the final, Roy, too, will qualify and I must say I fancy the Latvian’s chances.
“Like I said, it’s been a great week and it could have been even better. We have reached our targets but we could have exceeded them with a rub of the green — poor decisions that went against us, countback decisions, a point here and a point there — maybe that was frustrating.
“[Quarter-finalist] Michael Conlan was very unlucky not to have beaten the European champion [Andrew Selby of Wales]. He was a revelation. There is no way he was three points down at the end of the first round. But he came back gallantly, won the second, won the third, won two rounds and still lost the fight and that’s very disappointing if not very unusual.
“[Quarter-finalist] Darren O’Neill was beaten by the man [Ryota Murata of Japan] who beat the two-time world champion but he had been three days on the road — three very hard contests.
“It gets harder and harder to win medals at these championships.
“There is nobody lying down, there is no easy draw, everybody is really tough.
“They are full-time athletes and it’s testament to our association, to our High Performance Unit and all those like the Irish Sports Council who help build the structures around it that we are now producing these performances on the world stage. We have won medals at every major championship since the World Championships in Chicago four years ago.
*RTÉ Sport will broadcast live coverage of Nevin’s semi-final today at 11.25am on RTÉ One and streamed live on RTÉ.ie.
