Mick Conlan felt he needed to “stand up for future generations”

Mick Conlan does not regret his post-fight rant at the Rio Olympics. Indeed the Belfast man thinks he may have made a difference in terms of lessening corruption for future generations.

Conlan lost his Olympic bantamweight quarter final to Vladimir Nikitin, despite seemingly dominating the bout, and would call the AIBA “f*cking cheats” live on RTÉ following the bout.

While the outburst was in the heat of the moment, Conlan stands by his allegations and believes they will benefit amateur boxing.

Speaking today on BBC Radio Ulster’s Good Morning Ulster, Conlan told how “I still stick by what I said, I was robbed.”

“Yeah I’m still angry about it but you’ve got to move on.”

“There is no point going over it, I still stick with what I said but I have to think of my next steps.”

While the AIBA promised to punish Conlan, they also relegated the so-called ‘Magnificent Seven’ of full-time R&Js, and the Clonard ABC fighter knows it is due to his widely-seen interview. Conlan described how “they are denying it, but they have sacked seven judges and that would not have happened had I not spoke out about it and that speaks for itself.

“They have said it was nothing to do with me, but it obviously is.”

The 24 year old feels that there would have been no change if he hadn’t made his grievances known, and explained that “nothing was going to be said, nothing was going to happen until someone spoke out.”

“I’ve had bad decisions before and took it on the chin, this time I felt the need to stand up for future generations and put an end to it.”