Rio de Janeiro: Australian boxer Shelley Watts has stormed out of the ring after being eliminated from the Olympic tournament in her first fight, a split decision loss to Italian teenager Irma Testa.
Watts, the Commonwealth Games gold medallist, was considered a medal chance in the women's lightweight division but has been left devastated with the result, while assistant coach Don Abnett insists the ringside officials made the wrong call.
Two of the judges scored it 39-37 in favour of the Italian, while the Uzbek judge liked the way Watts went about her work and gave her the bout 37-39.
Watts didn't stop in the media mixed zone to speak to waiting reporters, instead offering a half-hearted "the judges make the call and they did an amazing job" as she made a beeline for the sanctuary of the dressing room.
Abnett said he and head coach Kevin Smith felt Watts had executed their plans to perfection and was struggling to believe the IABA judges weren't thinking along the same lines.
"I've got to say the judges saw it different to the two coaches saw it. These things happen in boxing but it's terrible to accept something like this at the Olympic Games," Abnett said.
"The way I saw it, Shelley pretty much had it under control. I don't know what the judges were looking for. They didn't see see Shelley winning, or two out of the three didn't.
"The head coach and Shelley had seen her at the European Championships and they came up with a pretty good plan. That plan was stuck to, as far as I could see. And it paid off, to get her mid-range and hit her on the back foot."
While Watts and her camp were left searching for answers, the Australian fighter may have paid a price for a slow start as she failed to find a way to be effective against Testa, a much taller fighter (10cm) with a substantial reach advantage.
She moved well for her size and proved a difficult target, keeping Watts at range and counterpunching her way to the opening two rounds.
Watts was then left to chase the fight, working her way back into the contest but never really looking like she was in control of proceedings. Boxing tends to turn up funny results at the best of times and the Australian camp choose to believe this was one of those occasions.
Watts will decide on her future in the sport when she simmers down but will likely be motivated to defend her Commonwealth Games crown on the Gold Coast in 2018.
"Hopefully she'll bounce back, come back at the Commonwealth Games. They're hard pills to swallow, ones like that."
0 comments
New User? Sign up