BOXING:An incandescent Pete Taylor said yesterday his daughter and Olympic champion Katie had wasted five months training for a European Championships that will not now take place this year.
Furthermore, the Olympic coach is deeply angered that during a press conference on Thursday he was allowed to comment on Katie’s preparations for the championships when members of the Irish Amateur Boxing Association (IABA), who were in attendance as hosts, knew that what he was saying was untrue.
“It’s been a wasted five months of our lives, my daughter’s life” said Taylor yesterday.
To add to the feeling of disrespect, 26-year-old Katie was yesterday morning still training for a European event that was not going to happen and by 2pm yesterday afternoon the IABA had still not informed her or father the world governing body had decided that not only would Ireland not host the event but it was postponed to 2014.
At the press conference Taylor innocently commented that Katie’s training was progressing well and the five fights they had lined up were all part of a schedule focused on the European Championships that Ireland would host in the autumn.
Sat on hands
The IABA officials sat on their hands knowing this to be incorrect. They knew the championships would not be taking place because of a letter sent to them by the European governing body.
The IABA say the letter was signed by European Boxing Confederation president Franco Falcinelli and dated Wednesday, January 30th. They say they became aware of it on the Thursday, the day of the press conference.
The letter states: “In regards to your request to host the 2013 European Women’s Championship in Dublin, I would like to inform you that this year we will not be holding the competition.”
What seems inexplicable is why nobody thought it necessary to inform the five-times European champion, four- times world champion and Olympic champion before the press conference.
Pete and Katie were allowed leave CityWest to go training in the belief that the championships were still taking place in Ireland.
Ten minutes after they departed the press were told there would be no European Championships this year, although even that was fudged.
“It doesn’t look good for the women’s Euros to be held at all in 2013,” the conference was told, when the letter explicitly states it would not be held.
Raw and perplexing
Their anger now is directed at the IABA, although the staging of the European Championships was out of their control. But the casual humiliation at the press conference remains raw and perplexing.
“Katie didn’t need to be hammering away at training for all those months,” added Pete. “I am angry about it. This is messing around with people’s lives.
“I leave a press conference still talking about the European Championships and they didn’t even say anything when they were sitting there. What a waste of time.
“Katie could have taken all those months off after the Olympics and refreshed her body and then come back into a programme for Rio. She could have gone off and relaxed or played football. Did you see her on Thursday, she was walking around on Thursday with a black eye. What for? What a waste of time.
“Killing her training”
“They still haven’t contacted me about it. I’m going to go to Katie now and she’ll ask me what we are training for. I’ve been killing her training, killing her, and I’ll have no answer. Katie’s going to say to me I could have taken those months off. What a joke.”
The irony is Katie is the star turn on the Elite Boxing Championships finals night, which was the point of the press conference.
The IABA wants her to fight against Polish lightweight Karolina Graczyk as a support bout. She is the draw to sell tickets in a venue that can hold 5,000 or 6,000 people, much more than the traditional venue of the National Stadium.
That must now be strained. She has five fights organised over four weeks between February 22nd and March 22nd.
