On Saturday, Balls.ie spoke to Mayo boxer Ray Moylette about his career-defining box-off scheduled for tonight (Monday) at the National Stadium. If Moylette had won that fight against Dean Walsh, he would have booked his place in a tournament in Baku where he could have earned one of the last Olympic places left.
In what is only the latest in a series of IABA fiascos, boxers had made preparations only to be told at the last minute that there was a change of plans. The four boxers (Dean Walsh, Ray Moylette, Michael O'Reilly and Conor Wallace) due to fight in box-offs to decide who would go to the last Olympic qualifiers in Baku were only given 48 hours notice that their fights were cancelled.
The IABA Central Council met on Saturday and decided that box-offs were not needed after all and that the High Performance coaching team, lead by Zaur Antia, would pick the best boxer over the course of a ten-day training camp in Baku leading up to the qualifiers on June 14th.
The boxers were only informed after the decision was taken on Saturday afternoon of this decision. The selection process for the fighters involved has been shambolic from the very start – particularly in the light-welterweight division.
First of all, Dean Walsh beat Ray Moylette in a highly contentious decision at the National Elite finals in December of last year. This followed an equally controversial verdict which also went Walsh's way the previous January.
This earned Walsh (a nephew of former High Performance Head Coach, Billy Walsh) the right to represent Ireland at the Olympic qualifying tournament in Samsun in Turkey where he was unsuccessful in trying to secure a spot in Rio. Walsh was beaten in yet another close decision by Lorenzo Sotomayor of Azerbaijan and was then sent home from the tournament (along with Michael O'Reilly from Portlaoise) and fined €5000 following an unspecified disciplinary breach.
IABA president Pat Ryan described the breaches as “minor issues” at the time but it was widely reported that Walsh and O'Reilly would face a box-off against the fighers they beat (Ray Moylette and Conor Wallace respectively) at the National Elite finals in December.
The fighters were given three to four weeks' notice of these box-offs and preparations were made by all involved. Under the byzantine rules of the IABA – the box-offs had to be ratified at a meeting of their Central Council on Saturday and this was expected by all and sundry to simply be a matter of them rubber-stamping the fights.
Instead the decision was made to invite the fighters to a ten-day training camp in Baku (which was set to take place for most of the High Performance Unit in any case).
As well as the four fighters set to take place in the box-offs, Sean McComb was added to the mix alongside Walsh and Moylette at light-welterweight so Zaur Antia and his coaching team now have three boxers at the weight to chose from.
Making Walsh and O'Reilly face box-offs in the first place for unspecified reasons was something of a mystery – they won their national finals in December and probably earned the right to represent Ireland in the qualifiers – regardless of how controversial Walsh's decision over Moylette may have been.
The box-offs were then mooted as the best solution and all seemed to be going well in that direction until Saturday's bombshell.
Ironically, considering the circumstances of Billy Walsh's departure from the IABA last September, the IABA has now - at the last minute – decided to do what Walsh always wanted – to leave selection of Irish teams in the hands of the High Performance coaches.
But the picture doesn't necessarily end there. If Moylette is not selected by Zaur and his team and either Walsh or McComb represent Ireland at the Baku qualifier - then that is their last chance. But if they fail to qualify - then Moylette has a possibility of a backdoor entry. He took part in the ABS/WSB series (basically a hybrid of professional and amateur boxing organised by the AIBA (the international governing body of amateur boxing) which are due to have the very last qualifying tournament at an as-yet-unnamed date in July.
But Moylette can only take part in that if Ireland's light-welterweight spot has not been filled by whoever is selected for the first qualifier in Baku. Or if he is selected - he could essentially get two chances. There's a lot for Zaur and his team to consider. Surely the box-off would have resolved things is some sort of definitive manner. As ever with the IABA... the deeper you look, the less you know.
