Walsh Waltzes along the road to Tokyo – Belfast fighter moves to within two wins of an Olympic place
Aidan Walsh secured Ireland’s first win of Day 3 of the European Olympic qualifiers in London today.
Welterweight Walsh waltzed past Estonian Pavel Kamanin to take one step closer to the 2020 Olympics.
The Belfast counter puncher looked at ease throughout and looked particularly impressive in the second stanza, where he hurt as well as out boxed Kamanin.
In-form Frenchman Wahid Hambli awaits the stylist but get through that Wednesday afternoon clash and the boxing sibling has two bites of the cherry for an Olympic spot – most likely versus Ukrainian Yevhenii Barabanov, a double European bronze medallist, or a very winnable box-off.
Walsh was up on his toes for the first round and forced his opponent to follow him around the ring for three minutes.
🥊 RESULT 🥊
— IABA (@IABABOXING) March 16, 2020
A counter attacking clinic from @aidanwalsh997 and he gets the win by unanimous decision v 🇪🇪!
He now moves into the Last 16 v 🇫🇷 on Wednesday.
Well done Aidan! 🇮🇪🥊#IABA #RoadToTokyo pic.twitter.com/VQqaM78DdJ
The output from either wasn’t massive, indeed the referee had to tell them to box on one occasion, but all the clean work came from the brother of Michaela Walsh and he won the round by a distance.
Walsh continued to show quality footwork in the second, but seemed to find a distance he was more effective from. His output increased and he twice hurt his opponent with two counter right hands, the highlights of a dominant second round. Indeed so dominant was the Belfast fighter in the second stanza that one judge scored it 10-8 in his favour.
With the fight all but tied up the third round was more procession than anything else. The Estonian remained full of effort, but never looked likely to secure the knockout he needed.
Ireland have three more fighters in action today. Up next will be Michael Nevin followed by Brendan Irvine and Kurt Walker.
Click HERE to see Day 3 fight times and for information on how to watch each fight.
Irish squad
(Olympic qualification standard in brackets)
Male
52kg Brendan Irvine (St Paul’s, Antrim) Cpt (Top 8)
57kg Kurt Walker (Canal, Antrim) (Top 8)
63kg George Bates (St Mary’s, Dublin) (Top 8)
69kg Aidan Walsh (Monkstown, Antrim) (Top 6)
75kg Michael Nevin (Portlaoise, Laois) (Top 6)
81kg Emmet Brennan (Dublin Docklands) (Top 6)
91kg Kiril Afanasev (Smithfield, Dublin) (Top 4)
91+kg Dean Gardiner (Clonmel, Tipperary) (Top 4)
Female
51kg Carly McNaul (Ormeau Road, Belfast) (Top 6)
57kg Michaela Walsh (Monkstown, Antrim) (Top 6)
60kg Kellie Harrington (St Mary’s, Dublin) (Top 6)
69kg Christina Desmond (Fr Horgan’s, Cork, Garda BC) (Top 5)
75kg Aoife O’Rourke (Castlerea, Roscommon) (Top 4)
High-Performance Director: Bernard Dunne
Coaches: Zaur Antia, John Conlan, Dmitry Dimitruk
