Team GB boss Rob McCracken discusses Amy Broadhurst selection
The decision to pick Amy Broadhurst to represent Team GB in the upcoming Olympic qualifying tournament was a unanimous one reveals head coach Rob McCracken.
The Louth native, who won World and European Championship gold for Ireland, was confirmed as Britain’s lightweight choice for the Paris qualification tournament, which gets underway in Thailand late next month, on Monday night.
The news comes after the 27-year-old revealed she was exploring switching to Britain in a bid to live her Olympic dream last month.
The multi-time Irish champion, who won the English Elite title at light welterweight in 2018, had a brief period training with the British team and did enough to impress.
Broadhurst got the nod ahead of Shona Whitwell and a disgruntled Gemma Richardson and is now Team GB’s 60kg Paris Olympic hopeful.
The move has proved controversial and resulted in mixed reactions in Ireland and across Britain. However, when commenting on the selection McCracken kept it strictly business, pointing out he and his team simply picked the best boxer available for selection.
“GB Boxing’s selection criteria dictates that we choose people that demonstrate the potential to qualify for and to win a medal at the Olympic Games and, having closely assessed all of the boxers at recent training camps and examined their past performances at elite international tournaments, the coaches were unanimous in their view of which boxer fulfilled the criteria most in the women’s lightweight division,” he said.
