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Michaela Walsh’s departure leaves Kellie Harrington as final Irish boxer at Olympic Games

Walsh: ‘There doesn’t seem to be any consistency with the judging, but that’s out of our control’

Ireland’s Michaela Walsh congratulates Svetlana Staneva of Bulgaria after the fight. Photograph: James Crombie/Inpho
Ireland’s Michaela Walsh congratulates Svetlana Staneva of Bulgaria after the fight. Photograph: James Crombie/Inpho
Fri Aug 02 2024 - 17:26

Michaela Walsh reflected on a “disappointing” week for Irish boxing at the Olympic Games as she became the latest fighter to be knocked out of the competition.

The 31-year-old Belfast fighter lost on Friday by unanimous decision to Bulgarian Svetlana Staneva in the women’s -57kg category.

It means nine of Ireland’s 10 boxers at the Games have been eliminated, with defending Olympic champion Kellie Harrington facing Brazil’s Beatriz Ferreira in the lightweight semi-final on Saturday night.

When asked about Ireland’s record at the Games, Walsh believes some of her team-mates have been “hard done by”.

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Speaking post-fight, Walsh said: “I’m fully focused on myself, I’m obviously very disappointed for a lot of my team-mates.

“I feel a lot of them were really hard done by, most of them actually. There doesn’t seem to be any consistency with the judging, but that’s out of our control.

“All we can control is what we do in the ring and whatever those five judges decide outside that’s all that can happen.”

Walsh was competing in her second Olympics and was watched on in the crowd by her boxer brother Aidan, who lost to Makan Traore on Sunday, and she wished Staneva the best for the competition.

“It was a close fight, she’s a great opponent,” Walsh added. “She’s current European champion and I just wish her all the best going forward and hope she can go all the way, she’s a great person as well, but unfortunately we just had to meet first round.”

Staneva will face Taiwan’s Lin Yu-ting, one of the boxers at the centre of a gender row at the Olympics, in the quarter-finals after she recorded a unanimous decision victory over Uzbekistan’s Sitora Turdibekova in their Round of 16 clash.