BOXING showed its other face on a night of drama and controversy in Paris, with Dublin heavyweight Jack Marley beaten by the better man as his Olympic journey came to an end.
A bronze medal up for grabs, the 21-year-old put plenty of educated pressure on slick second seed Davlat Boltaev, but all too often found himself swiping at thin air as the elusive Tajikistani managed to avoid missiles by millimetres en route to a split decision win.
And while Boltaev wasn’t throwing too much himself, he always appeared in control; always appeared comfortable while Marley was throwing everything at the cause, often in vain, trying to draw the reigning Asian Games champion into his kind of fight.
Just as on Sunday, when he bludgeoned his way beyond Poland’s Mateusz Bereznicki hours after Grainne Walsh’s shock, it was up to Marley to try and lift the mood in the wake of Daina Moorehouse’s earlier defeat to Frenchwoman Wassila Lkahadiri.
Even though his own fight was coming up later, the Monkstown man couldn’t help but be outraged by the manner of the Bray pocket rocket’s controversial exit.
“I watched it,” he said.
“I didn’t really let it affect me, as much as I wanted to punch the screen, I couldn’t really. I had to keep my own focus, I had a mission to do and I had to put the blinders on.”
Reflecting on his exit, Marley acknowledged Boltaev had been difficult to pin down, insisting the only way to try and make life uncomfortable for the 25-year-old was “just give it socks”.
“He was elusive, yeah, I thought I out-punched him. It is what it is.
“I’m proud that I got here, so far, I’m not going to be too ungrateful for it. And I’m grateful for the amount of support I had out there, it was unbelievable.
“We have to regroup and go again. I’ll have a look back at it later tonight and then forget about it in the morning, same process. It’s just another fight.
“I gave it my all at least. That’s the least you can do in this sport.”
On his way into the North Paris Arena before his first fight four days earlier, Marley was asked to leave the ring with “no regrets”. Even in defeat the same applied after an all-action operator against a quality operator.
“Yeah, I live by that tonight. It’s a bit of a harder one to swallow tonight but I have an amazing group around me and I’ll be grand. I’ll be getting slagged before I leave here tonight anyway.”
The youngest member of the Irish team, Marley has already shown that a big future awaits. Whether that means aiming for the next Olympic Games in Los Angeles - should boxing still be a part of it - or moving into the paid ranks, he knows this experience will stand to him.
“I said before I came out here that I’m going to take in as much of the Olympic Games as I can without it affecting my performance, and I believe I’ve done that.
“And then after this I can take in the full experience of the Olympic Games, what it’s really like, and I can be up in those stands shouting on Kellie [Harrington] and Michaela [Walsh] just as much as I’d like to be cheered on.”
Running order
Friday, August 2
57kg last 16: M Walsh v SK Staneva (Bulgaria) – 2.46pm
Saturday, August 3
60kg semi-final: K Harrington v B Ferreira (Brazil) – 9.08pm
