In the wake of Irish boxer Michael Conlan’s curse-laden protest over his stunning defeat on Tuesday to Vladimir Nikitin, the International Boxing Association has removed multiple judges from being able to moderate any more boxing matches at this year’s Olympics.
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“I hope it’s not true and I hope he’s still in the semi-final but I don’t think he deserves to be there anyway”.
But there remains voices within AIBA who say the issue revolves around the integrity of the organization, not the performance of a few judges, and those voices didn’t back down on Wednesday. He also offered up a gift of his own for the “young lad”.
On Wednesday, AIBA, the governing body for Olympic boxing, acknowledging the firestorm that’s been whipped up by a number of freaky decisions in Rio by removing an undisclosed number of judges and referees after determining that a “handful of decisions were not at the level expected”, though it stopped short of saying the decisions would be reversed.
What people might forget is just how good the fight was, how good Park was, and also how magnanimously Jones accepted the outrageous decision on the day in the ring.
“AIBA cheats, he f**king cheats”. “I don’t give a f**k for cursing on TV”. In the end they embarrassed the sport by voting 10-9 for the Russian, securing a gold for the favorite but the loser on the night. My dream has been shattered now.
Josh Buatsi was then denied a gold-medal fight last night when Kazakhstan fighter Adilbek Niyazymbetov was controversially awarded the contest on points. I’ve got a big career ahead of me and these, they’re known for being cheats.
The following morning, Michael Conlan, who, like Tishchenko, is the No.1 seed and world champion, was fighting Russia’s Vladimir Nikitin for a place in the semifinals and a medal, which Ireland badly needed. “But these are highly educated and competent referees and judges that are on the circuit full-time, being paid, so they should know better than we do”.
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On Wednesday night, Conlan appeared on Off The Ball where he doubled down on his condemnation for the current state of amateur boxing and continued to question its legitimacy.
