Olympic gold won’t come easy for Katie, warns Dad

Peter Taylor yesterday spoke of the pressure facing his daughter because of the presumption she will be bringing home Ireland’s first Olympic gold medal in 20 years.

The father and coach of the 26-year-old five-time world champion was speaking at an event to mark the refurbishment of Bray Boxing Club which has also seen Adam Nolan qualify for the Games.

“I don’t think she’s taking on the responsibility of making the Olympics a good tournament, I think she’s taking on the responsibility of ensuring that female boxing carries on in the Olympics,” said Taylor.

“Everyone is going to be watching the women’s boxing now and if she wins an easy gold medal then it will devalue all the other medals and World Championships and Europeans that she’s won.

“People might not think much of the standard of female boxing. But if you have all the best girls there then people will realise just how difficult it is. All people read about is Katie winning gold without seeing it and they probably think she must be winning it easily.

“But as you could see in the final and semi-final of the World Championships, these medals have always been hard to win and are getting harder all the time. We’re trying to keep one step ahead of everyone.”

However Taylor was also left frustrated and criticised the qualifying system which Taylor came through in China. “It’s just mad. Katie beat a Tunisian girl who has still qualified, she beat a Kazakhstan girl who has still qualified yet if she had been beaten she might not qualify.

“I don’t think it was really thought about too well. If they were going to do that they should have done it on a continent-by-continent basis.

“Australia are technically the most successful boxing nation in the world because they’ve had more Olympic qualifiers than Cuba and Russia have. It should be the best girls for the Olympic games, because you want to beat the best. No disrespect to the girls but if you get to the Olympic final by beating two girls who didn’t win a fight in the World Championships then it takes a little bit of the edge off it.”