Joe Ward has retained his Irish light-heavyweight title after an awesome destruction of Kenneth Egan at the National Stadium. The Westmeath teenager once-again showed phenomanal power and aggressive skills as he stormed to a 29 points to 10 win. Egan admitted afterwards that he simply couldn’t deal with surperior strength of his opponent as Ward showed that last year’s victory over the Beijing silver medallist was no fluke. Despite slipping to the canvas in the second round, the Moate boxer won all three rounds, including by a 10-point margin in the final round. He’ll now travel to Turkey in April to compete in an Olympic qualifying tournament. It means that Egan will not feature in London later this year, but the Neilstown man insisted after the fight that he had no intention of hanging-up his gloves yet. After Darren O’Neill was handed a walkover earlier, his fellow London Olympians, John Joe Nevin and Michael Conlan both claimed impressive victories. In the bantamweight decider, John Joe Nevin out-classed Michael Nevin as the Cavan man cruised to an emphatic 23 points to 3 victory. Conlan also impressed with another classy performance as he retained his flyweight title with a 19 points to 11 win over Chris Phelan. In the opening bout of the night, Paddy Barnes claimed another light-flyweight title as the Beijing bronze medallist claimed a 21 points to 17 win over Kildare’s Hugh Myers. Michael McDonagh produced a tactical masterclass to beat David Oliver Joyce by 17 points to 14 in the lightweight final. Adam Nolan retained his welterweight title after defeating John Joe Joyce by just two points in the fight of the night. Ross Hickey continues to attract plaudits in the light-welterweight division after a 21 points to 5 win over Stephen Coughlan. Tommy McCarthy won the heavyweight crown with a third-round knock-out of Christy Joyce. In the final bout of the night, Con Sheehan retained his super-heavyweight title with an emphatic 25-10 win over Sean turner. In tonight’s women’s finals, Lynn McEnery won the 48kg category when she beat Oliwia Samsanow by 11 points to 7 and Micheala Walsh won the 57kg final after a 13 points to 10 win over Dervla Duffy.
Joe Ward is declared the winner against Ken Egan ©INPHO
