“Nothing” could have won World Championships medal for Amy Broadhurst

Ironic considering she is a boxer but Amy Broadhurst believes her recent World Championship quarter-final fate was out of her own hands.

The Dundalk fighter lost a 64kg quarter-final to home fighter Simranjit Kaur in India on Tuesday last and thus her chances of a coveted world medal.

Broadhurst looked to have won, at least, the first and third rounds in what was a dramatic fight. A potential knockdown was ruled a slip in the final stanza, moments before the Dealgan southpaw was given a bizarre point deduction for ‘hitting with the inside of the glove’.

The 21-year-old had indeed been warned twice but the deduction came following what looked to be a perfect shot.

While, the deduction had no effect on the final result with a 3-2 split in Simranjit’s favour changing to a 3-1 verdict with one drawn card most felt it Broadhurst didn’t lose a medal but had one taken from her.

Broadhurst, was left in tears, agrees and after being given time to reflect claimed she now thinks there was nothing she could have done to win the fight.

“I’m devastated,” she told 2fm’s Game On. “I was so close to getting the medal. I trained all year so hard, and then for something like that to happen.

“Yesterday I was upset but I woke up this morning and I was just angry.”

“Everything looked like it was set up for the Indian to win. Before the competition, they had mentioned they wanted four medals. The girl who beat me yesterday, that was their fourth medal.”

“It looked like there was nothing I could do that was going to win me that fight.”

It’s another contentious decisions at another high profile championships and while some suggest some of the rounds were close the point deduction and, to a lesser extent, the ‘slip’ ruling just didn’t sit right with watching fans, leaving the amateur end of the game open to questions yet again.

Broadhurst certainly wants answers and wasn’t shy about claiming she lost because of boxing politics not boxing talent.

“Some of the decisions have been absolutely terrible. It’s not really fair, not just on me but other boxers who came over here with a dream of becoming world champion and because there’s politics outside of the ring.”

“Everyone around me was telling me that I should have won and I felt I had won. One of the Indian coaches actually went up to one of our coaches and said he thought I won the fight.”

“For something so important like a world medal, that I’ve always dreamed of, to be taken away from me like that is heartbreaking and hard to come back from,” she added before discussing the ‘slap’.

“I’ve never slapped with my back hand. It’s either a swing and a miss or I land it. If I was going to slap, it would be by accident with my right hand. I knew I connected. He warned me in the first round when I stepped back, threw a one-two and connected. He stopped that and said ‘stop slapping’.”

“He warned me again one more time after that and he then took the point off me. But none of them were really slaps, I was connecting. I felt I was connecting anyway and he thought differently I suppose.”

It certainly leaves a bitter taste in the Dundalk fighters mouth, but the controversial defeat won’t stop the Louth youngster from boxing.

Making Toyko will be hard as she would have to over take Kelly Harrington in 60kg pole, but the young talent isn’t giving up on her Olympic dream.

“I don’t anything will ever take away the love I have for the sport, but when things like this happen it makes me angry,” she continued.

“I put my whole life into this sport. I train full-time with no funding and if I had medalled yesterday that could have pushed me towards a bit of funding but it was just taken away from me.”

“I still want to make the Olympics. From [being] a little girl, all I’ve thought about is the Olympics.

“I don’t know if it’s going to be in 2020 but I’m still going to continue to chase that Olympic dream.”