Brett McGinty shares classy statement following questionable World Championships defeat

There was disappointment yesterday for Donegal-Derry welter Brett McGinty at the World Youth Championships in Russia.

The Oakleaf BC fighter lost his Round of 32 bout with Slovakian Andrej Csemez via split-decision, however many, including the Irish coaches, felt McGinty was deserving of the win against the recent European Youth bronze medalist.

The AIBA are trialing using all five judges at ringside for these championships, and three sided with the Central European, while two went for the Ulsterman (29:28 x2, 27:30, 29:28, 29:27)

A tight bout no doubt, people took issue with the scoring of the contest which seemed to see McGinty build his way into the bout and finish strong, landing the heavier shots.

The big problem cited with the scoring was the decision of the Taiwanese judge to award all three rounds to Csemez, and most notably the Colombian judge who gave the final round against McGinty by an almost inexplicable 10:8 margin

In a classy message posted on social media, the Irish team captain said the following:

Unfortunately my World Championships ended today in a fight I felt I had definitely won, especially the last round which a Colombian judge gave against me 10:8 – which over everything frustrates me the most.

These decisions seem to happen way top often in boxing. for whatever reason I will never know.

I would like to thank everyone for the support, I really do appreciate it. I was very proud to captain my country at such a big tournament. I didn’t get the gold medal me and all the boys came for but there wasn’t much I could do about it.

We still have six quality boxers left in the tournament and no doubt a few gold medals in them.

Today aside it’s been a great journey with an even better team and hopefully we’ll have more to look forward to in the future.

Watch Brett McGinty v Andrej Csemez below in full (fight starts at 13minutes):