IRELAND’S MICHAELA WALSH and Kellie Harrington will each take home bronze medals from the European Boxing Championships after their impressive respective campaigns in Bulgaria reached their conclusions at the semi-final stage this afternoon.
Featherweight Walsh, 25, was always likely to be up against it versus reigning continental lightweight queen Daria Abramova.
She fought valiantly as is her wont, but was ultimately denied a place in tomorrow’s final by the Russian — controversially losing by split decision.
Belfast’s Irish champion had already sealed her fourth major international medal having reached the last four, and has now taken to the podium at three successive major international events.
Her conqueror today, Abramova, beat familiar Finn Mira Potkonen to claim continental gold in the 2016 final a division above.
Katie Taylor’s 2016 Olympic scourge, however, wreaked further havoc upon another Irish fighter earlier this afternoon as she edged out Dubliner Kellie Harrington in a searing semi-final contest at lightweight.
Having finally beaten Taylor in Rio at the sixth time of asking, 37-year-old Potkonen has since become a thorn in the side of the Bray woman’s lightweight successor, besting Harrington in the EU Championships final last year before sealing victory in today’s European semi.
This was an entirely different fight to last August’s demolition job, however. Indeed, Harrington can consider herself unfortunate — if not at all cheated — to have come out on the wrong end of a razor-thin verdict.
Harrington departs Bulgaria with European bronze — her third major international medal — and has certainly gotten closer to Potkonen, with whom she might well trade leather again at Tokyo 2020.
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