‘Dreams aren’t exclusive to one athlete’ – High-Performance Director ignores Broadhurst noise and defends selection policy
High-Performance Director Tricia Heberle insists the qualification of a record-equaling 10 boxers to the Paris Olympics justifies the IABA’s selection policy.
Selection with regard to International tournaments and Olympic qualifiers are always a thing of huge debate. However, discourse reached new levels in the current cycle, firstly around the selection of Jennifer Lehane and Aidan Walsh, who were selected ahead of the reigning Irish champions at their weight on different occasions, but more so around Amy Broadhurst.
After not being chosen at 66kgs, the Dundalk fighter defected to Team GB where she unsuccessfully attempted to qualify at lightweight.
On the other hand Grainne Walsh got over the line in impressive fashion at 66kgs and that aligned with the fact Aidan Walsh and Lehane also became boxing Olympians proves the right selection calls were made suggests, Heberle.
“We don’t hide away from the fact that it has been quite challenging around selection, we’ve had criticism and obviously there have been individual athlete agendas that have been at play,” she said to media on Monday morning.
“We tried to manage that professionally and to never lose sight of what is important and that is the athletes that are in front of us that are doing the right things and that we believe can deliver under pressure.
“I think the decisions we made around the athletes that could qualify in this sort of team size were absolutely correct and I feel there’s no defence warranted of the decisions or the processes that were taken.
“This is just such a fantastic thing for Irish boxing but also a fantastic achievement for Irish sport. We want to be part of history, we want to create new records and all of these athletes involved in this programme feel that they want to leave a legacy.”
Pushed further on the Broadhurst scenario, Heberle admitted she had sympathy for the Louth lady, who won World and European gold in an Irish singlet.
However, she said she paid no heed to the noise surrounding her move to Team GB, and points out no one has a monopoly on Olympic pain.
“I like to post on Twitter myself, but I’m not a great one for social media and the boxing sites. I have a look every now and then, but the key thing for me is not to be distracted.
“My job is to keep that bigger picture view of what we’re trying to achieve, and I just keep bringing myself back to ‘we’re trying to qualify eight athletes and win three medals at the Olympic Games’ – but everyone’s human.
“Yeah there was noise, but in this world we’re allowed to have different opinions on things, and also we probably have different recollections of things that happen. I’m very pleased with how we handled it, because we basically handled it by the jurisdiction I have as the chair of the selection panel.
“We have things we have to do. Elite sport is not fair, and lots of kids have Olympic dreams… Olympic dreams aren’t exclusive to one athlete, and yeah there was an empathy for Amy because she was one of our athletes.
“But you just can’t be distracted. We have to be bigger than that, and I have to keep reiterating that message to keep my staff focused, because they’re all humans and often things are put out which are completely incorrect.
“But what’s the point of going there? Amy Broadhurst is a British athlete, and I’ll keep saying that the only athletes I’m interested in are the people in front of me, and they’re all wearing green.
“That’s what we did yesterday and now the challenge is that we got to the Olympics and we build on qualification, because we’re not going to Paris to participate – we’re going to Paris to be in the medal rounds and on the podium.”
