PORTLAOISE MIDDLEWEIGHT MICHAEL Nevin has doubled Ireland’s medal tally at the 2019 European Games, with at the least two boxers now guaranteed to take domestic bronze at worst from Minsk.
In a sensational exhibition of boxing, the fashionable middleweight edged Turkey’s Guler Serhat, a former World Series of Boxing (WSB) competitor, on a 4-1 split to reach the semi-finals at 75kg.
It’s a primary global medal at Senior Elite degree for Nevin, who has for years been touted as one of the most prodigiously talented boxers inside the USA.
The 21-year-antique is a 3-time European champion at underage degree, winning gold as a Schoolboy, Junior, and Youth in addition to World Championships bronze inside the latter age category.
However, he turned into selected for the Irish squad in the absence of Senior Elite champion Gabriel Dossen, who neglected out through injury.
Having greater than taken advantage of his stroke of good fortune — or Dossen’s misfortune, depending on which way you have a look at it — Nevin is now fought away from stamping his mark at the continent as a person.
Less than an hour before Nevin’s fulfillment, Bray mild-flyweight Regan Buckley secured Ireland’s first medal at this yr’s Games when he reached the ultimate four at 49kg.
Buckley beat Spain’s Martin Molina, additionally a WSB veteran, on a 4-1 break-up decision to guarantee himself as a minimum bronze in Minsk.
The 22-yr-vintage St Teresa’s BC guy turned into adjudged to were the winner by means of judges from Russia, Cuba, Korea, and Poland, with a Bosnian judge seeing the contest the opposite manner.
“I’m over the moon, to be sincere with ya,” Buckley said. “It turned into a difficult-fought fight — the Spanish man came ahead an awful lot and he was without a doubt compact, he threw a variety of punches so I needed to cope with him from the out of doors. There had been instances when I needed to blend it up with him as well.
“But we did what we had to to get the win. It became an excellent contest. First round, I become controlling the distance very well, I was catching him on the counter. The second round, I may have gotten into it a bit an excessive amount of with him at the interior. And then the coaches informed me inside the third round to bring it back out to a boxing match. I become operating off the jab in the final round and I become catching him with a few first-rate pictures, so I assume that’s what was given me the fight.
