VIDEO: ‘Dream come true’ for Joe Ward after earning Olympic berth

Mon, 12 Oct, 2015 - 21:29

Ireland's Joe Ward has secured his place at next year's Olympics after years of trying.

The light-heavyweight missed-out on London 2012, but is finally set to travel to an Olympics after reaching the final of the AIBA World Championships in Doha.

The Moate boxer beat Elshod Rasulov of Uzbekistan on points in their semi-final tonight to book his place in the decider.

The 21-year-old opened-up a deep cut above his opponent's left eye in the opening round and always enjoyed a measure of control during the rest of the bout, even though neither fighter was able to land too many clean punches.

He will fight Julio La Cruz, the Cuban who beat Ward in the 2013 World semi-finals, for gold on Thursday.

Ward has now matched the achievement of team captain Michael Conlan, who booked his place in the bantamweight final yesterday with a unanimous decision over his Belarussian opponent, Dmitry Asanu, and he'll now face another member of the Uzbeki team, Murodjon Akhmadaliev, in Wednesday's final.

There was disappointment yesterday for middleweight Michael O'Reilly, who lost his semi-final by two rounds to one.

However, the Portlaoise boxer still has one more chance to qualify for Rio. With the top three middleweights in Doho set to earn an Olympic spot, O'Reilly will now have to face Abdin Hasam of Egypt in a box-off on Wednesday.