Conlan ‘over the moon’ and pledges to win gold in Rio

Led by women’s gold medallist Katie Taylor, all the members of the Irish boxing team assembled at the ExCel yesterday to see Michael Conlan receive his medal.

And all the four medallists wore their medals around their necks as they posed for photographs to mark what was the greatest Olympic achievement by an Irish boxing team.

No one was happier than Michael Conlan. The 20-year-old Belfast lightweight vowed to be in Rio in four years’ time and, this time around, he will win the gold medal.

“It feels great,” he said.

“I’m over the moon with it. It’s just amazing. I’m still disappointed I did not get the gold medal but I’m happy and I’m so proud of myself for doing what I’ve done.

“If somebody told me four years ago, when I watched Paddy Barnes, that I was going to win a bronze medal at the London Olympics I would have jumped at it.

“See what it did for Paddy Barnes. Now, hopefully, it can springboard me on to the same step.

“I can’t wait for Rio now. Hopefully I’ll be on top of the podium next time. I’m looking forward to it. Everything is towards Rio now. I feel I can definitely win a gold medal.”

His father, mother and older brother joined him immediately after the presentation.

“He performed brilliantly for the occasion but that’s not the best Michael,” his father John said.

“Michael has an amazing talent and even when I see it sometimes it amazes me. He has got a fantastic boxing brain and he is very quick to change tactics and to do things that need to be done in the fight. Hopefully he’ll get a crack at it again.”

Paddy Barnes, who made history when he became the first Irish boxer to win two Olympic medals, was there to join in the celebrations with his fellow Belfast man. He was disappointed at losing to Shiming Zou on a dubious countback decision but admitted it was always going to be difficult to beat the Chinese light flyweight.

“It wasn’t the greatest performance of my life,” he said. “It’s difficult to perform your best against an opponent like Zou Shimmin because he’s so tricky. I’m happy that it was a really close fight and one that could have gone either way. It’s just a pity it didn’t go my way.”

Like all the other boxers he said he, too, would like to see Billy Walsh and Zaur Antia get their situation sorted out.

“You talk about the structure, well the structure in place is here and it’s obviously working and if that’s not in place it’s obviously not going to work.

“They’re the two coaches that have been with high performance from the start. Without them, there would be no high performance”.

Michael Conlan’s older brother, Jamie, who was supposed to fly out to Ibiza with his brother next Friday kindly gave his ticket to Paddy Barnes so they could enjoy a holiday together.