AIBA had said on Wednesday that it had reviewed all decisions in 239 bouts to date and found “less than a handful” were not at the level expected.
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The Guardian revealed exclusively on the eve of the Games the fears of senior officials within the sport that some of the bouts in Rio would be corrupted, alleging a group of referees and judges got together before major championships to decide who would win. Team USA’s Gary Russell lost a split decision to Uzbekistan’s Fazliddin Gaibnazarov, which prompted retired boxing champ Floyd Mayweather to say Russell had “clearly been robbed”.
Nikitin’s face was badly bloodied after the quarter-final, which most observers felt had been conclusively won by the Irishman.
“We’re getting better but Rome ain’t built in a day and we’re going to continue to raise that bar of excellence”, insisted Virgets, a member of Aiba’s executive board and chairman of its disciplinary committee.
The following day saw a furious reaction from Ireland’s world bantamweight champion Michael Conlan after a similarly controversial quarter-final defeat to Vladimir Nikitin of Russian Federation. Officials from both of the most high-profile disputed bouts were still working at the Olympics on Wednesday.
Aiba have strongly denied the allegations of corruption, with “no tangible proof” of match-fixing. There are seven judges who pick who judges the fights. They can emphasize whatever they want. “How much did they charge you bro?”. And these ones? They’re known for being cheats and they’ll always be cheats.
“Of course if your eye is so bad that it needs a lot of stitches, then you can’t fight but I am surprised that the Russian withdrew”, said Hamill, coach of All Saints welterweight Steven Donnelly who boxed very well in Rio, only exiting on a split decision to the number one seed.
The U.S. women won two medals, a gold and a bronze, at the 2012 Olympics in London, with middleweight Claressa Shields continuing the defense of her gold in Friday’s semifinals. “But the judges can’t be God”.
Several other fighters have complained vociferously about their losses in the last few days of the Olympics, as they invariably do in every worldwide amateur boxing tournament. The dilemma extends to the entire sport, of course: professional boxing judges are routinely accused of incompetence and corruption by angry fans and fighters.
This wasn’t the first complaint about Olympic judging.
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Aiba has recently changed from a system in which judges press a button to record a punch to a more interpretive system where a round-winner is handed 10 points and the loser is given a lesser number based on punches, aggression and tactics.
