Ireland full of hunger for World boxing champs after Olympic lows

Seven of the Olympians who competed for Ireland in Paris will box at the upcoming World Championships in Liverpool. 

Jack Marley was the only Irish boxer, bar Kelly Harrington who went on to claim gold, to win a fight at the Paris Olympics. Pic: ©INPHO/Dan Sheridan

Irish boxing coach Damian Kennedy says a 17-strong team will approach the upcoming World Championships in Liverpool with “a new hunger” after the disappointments of last year’s Olympic Games in Paris.

Kellie Harrington, who is retired but still training at the High-Performance Centre in Abbotstown, retained her title at Roland Garros in 2024 but Jack Marley was the only fighter among the other nine to win a single bout.

It amounted to a hugely frustrating experience for an Irish team that had gone to the French capital with such high hopes but only to experience a string of bad results during the initial stages of the tournament out at the Paris Nord Arena in Villepinte.

Seven of those Paris Olympians will feature at the very first major championships to be run by the new World Boxing association, starting this week, and the high-performance coach has been encouraged by the work put in through the last year.

“What I have seen since I've come back from the Olympic Games is just a complete determination, a real hunger within the squad. People have got a new sense of focus, a new sense of purpose. The goals have changed. They're still in the environment.

“They're still pushing themselves really hard and they're open to challenge. So, yeah, what that did, what it showed me, was just that determination that's been sowed in the squad. It has been phenomenal since they've all returned from the Olympic Games.” 

Kennedy made reference to some decisions that were “out of our control” at the Games. There were various factors feeding into the under-performance last summer, but that is all water under the many bridges that span the Seine at this point.

Zaur Antia was reluctant to delve into it all on the eve of another major bid, his insistence on looking forward chiming nicely with the fact that these world championships will be the first major event organised by the new World Boxing body.

No more IBA. A fresh start, for everybody.

The head coach was still up front about last summer. No excuses, he said. They wanted more from Paris - more wins and more medals - but they didn’t get them so now they move on as another Olympic cycle moves up a gear.

“Success has no limit,” said the Georgian. “We always have to prove ourselves. The more experience you have, you have to use it wisely. That's what we're thinking to do. I thought last Olympic Games we should have more medals. But what happened there, we will try next time to improve those things.

“But we have good talents. Again, talents need nurturing. They need more experience. They need more support. And then demand should be more as well. Sorry about these words but we try our best at the moment.” 

The future, said Antia, is bright and this latest Ireland bid will be launched on the back of three highly-productive training camps this year in China, Germany and the most recent in Sheffield.

There are close to 20 major medals in this group already and the likes of Aoife O’Rourke, Lisa O’Rourke and Michaela Walsh have taken golds at high-level championships in the past. So there is experience and proven class in a team that also contains younger and less tested boxers at this level.

“What I'm looking for, number one, I don't want to say a medal or something like this. You have to perform first before that happens,” said Antia. 

“All I'm looking for is their best performance, that the Irish team will try its best, perform best, is focused correctly. Everything else we will see."

Not everything is perfect.

Ireland have no injury worries going into the opening bouts in England but Antia echoed his new High-Performance director Jon Mackey’s words from a few weeks before when expressing the need for all boxers worldwide to be given more competitive time in the ring.

Jude Gallagher, while recovered from a hand injury, just misses out on Liverpool but with Antia insisting that the 60kg fighter has “a great future”. Aidan Walsh, a bronze medallist at the Tokyo Olympics, is another notable absentee from the team.

“Aidan Walsh, again, doesn't owe Irish boxing anything,” said Kennedy. “He's been a fantastic servant for Irish boxing. Aidan has a bit of thinking to do with what his future looks like as well. We're open for that discussion with Aidan, absolutely.” 

This is a strange sort of year. The 12 months after any Olympics always is as some athletes step away after such a major career goal and others move up the ladder. A development year, some call it.

“I won't say to you exactly what a development year is, but everything in my head is about performance,” Antia explained. “Let performance think about medals, but the main task for us is to develop these boxers for the Olympic Games.

“That's what it's about. Of course, medals are fantastic as well, but if you think about medals, you will not perform maybe. That's why it is performance first and everything else.”