Irish boxers confound sceptics

Egan after his quarter-final win over Brazil's Washington Silva

Olympic medallist Kenny Egan has said that Ireland's boxing performance in Beijing is a vindication of the system set-up by the country before the Games.

There were some voices within Irish boxing predicting failure in China.

Egan, who faces Britain's Tony Jefferies in the light-heavyweight semi-finals on Friday, says the criticisms were "a load of rubbish".

"There were a lot of people talking bad about us, about how the training camp was a disaster," said Dubliner Egan.

Egan added:"Some people were saying that the high-performance was no good and there's too much training being done."

Irish amateur boxing is renowned for its splits and controversies and there was criticism of the country's elite programme after only Paddy Barnes reached the quarter-finals in last autumn's World Championships in Chicago.

However, a late rush of qualifiers alongside Barnes lifted Irish spirits and meant that five hopefuls travelled to Beijing.

Some of them would be financially better off if they were stacking shelves in a supermarket Irish boxing manager Billy Walsh

Splendid performances over the last 12 days have meant that middleweight Darren Sutherland, light-flyweight Barnes and veteran Egan are all guaranteed places on the podium in Beijing - ending a eight-year Olympic medal drought for the entire Irish team across all sports.

Despite Ireland's successes, boxing team manager Billy Walsh says that the Irish fighters have had to overcome financial hardship in order to emulate former boxing medallists including Michael Carruth and Wayne McCullough.

"The funding has been very limited and to be honest some of them would be financially better off if they were stacking shelves in a supermarket," said Walsh.

"They're all contracted and they're on full-time training in Dublin but the problem is how to get the younger ones the funding they need for the long-term plans.

"It looks like we're going to be the only Irish medals coming out of Beijing and hopefully that will mean we get a lot more funding in the run-up to London 2012.

"The build-up starts now. We would hope to have an Irish fighter qualified at every weight and we've got plenty of young boxers who could be there given a fair chance."