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Olympic boxing: Five stories
- Updated: August 22, 2016
Nicola Adams took home another Olympic gold medal but not everyone was successful – what went wrong with Team USA’s big men, the judging and the professionals?
Professionals will dominate… won’t they?
The decision to allow professional boxers to represent their nations at Rio 2016 was met with widespread derision. The likes of Wladimir Klitschko flirted with the idea of entering – imagine one of the great professional heavyweight champions of this era boxing against a novice, argued the critics. As well as being unfair and arguably unsportsmanlike, the idea was plain dangerous.
It was largely ignored that, as of Rio 2016, wrestling is the sole Olympic sport which remains amateur-only (you will easily find critics who insist the generous rewards on offer from individual governing bodies negate this fact). Boxing was merely falling in line with the vast majority of Olympic sports by opening its doors to the professionals, who would inevitably wipe the floor with a bunch of kids still learning the ropes.
Apparently not. Only three professionals dared enter, after organisations like the WBA and IBF took a hard-line approach by voicing their disapproval at the move. Between the three pros in Rio, they won a total of two fights.
Hassan N’Dam N’Jikam of Cameroon (34-2) has held interim WBA and WBO middleweight titles but lost a unanimous decision in his first fight. Italy’s Carmine Tommasone (15-0) got to the second round before losing but the worst fate was reserved for Thailand’s Amnat Ruenroeng (17-1). Having only lost his IBF flyweight title earlier this year, he was knocked out by France’s Sofiane Oumiha.
The results were welcome proof that boxing over an amateur, three-round distance requires a tailored skill-set that 12-round pros cannot immediately adjust to. Justice, they might say, was done.
Remove headguards, add danger
The most obvious alteration to men’s Olympic boxing made at Rio 2016 was discarding the headgear. Anthony Joshua, Luke Campbell and co won gold in London with protection, but the boxers in Brazil would have no such comfort.
The main issue, as Michael Conlan’s controversial conqueror …
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