Dean Gardiner books spot on Irish team as IABA row rolls on

At an almost empty National Stadium on Wednesday night, in a box-off publicly announced just hours beforehand, Dean Gardiner beat Martin Keenan on a 4-1 split decision in their 91kg+ contest to book his place on the Irish team for the upcoming European Championships.

While the issue of who actually runs the Irish Athletic Boxing Association (IABA) is still very much up in the air, one thing for certain is that the Clonmel man will be on the plane to Kharkiv in the Ukraine after a classy performance over three three-minute rounds.

Gardiner was on top early on and caught Keenan with a big left hand in the second round which almost sent the Rathkeale boxer to the ground.

Some good combination work from Gardiner to the body of Keenan in the third and final round ensured the victory and means that the 2015 Irish Elite champion completes the team.

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Meanwhile, chief executive of Sport Ireland John Treacy has reiterated that there are still many problems to be ironed out in the IABA and the sport is "deeply divided."

Speaking to RTÉ after a Wednesday meeting with Minister of Sport Patrick O'Donovan, Treacy said: "There are still serious issues to be addressed," and that "the issue goes beyond team selection by committee".

The recent dispute erupted after a boxing team destined for the European Championships in Ukraine and selected by the newly appointed High Performance Director Bernard Dunne was changed by the IABA Central Council.

Sport Ireland saw the decision as a test of whether there had been real progress made in the move from old habits and old governance towards modernising the sport and believed there had not.

The IABA signed up to a Rio Review in which they promised to undertake modernisation of the rules that govern boxing. Treacy has now put a deadline of the end of June for that to happen and for the disagreement to be resolved.

Treacy added that a commitment was made to Sport Ireland that an IABA council meeting would be convened last weekend to ‘air the issue’ but this had not happened.

Responding to the growing crisis, Junior Minister of Sport Patrick O'Donovan called the meeting in Dublin on Tuesday for all sides to meet. However IABA president Pat Ryan did not turn up and the meeting was abandoned. The Minister said it was not respectful. Ryan said he had family matters to attend to.

Another meeting was held yesterday and Ryan, before entering, told RTÉ that boxing was not divided. Treacy then went on RTÉ radio and said that it remained deeply polarised.

Whether boxing continues to be funded after the June deadline if there is no agreement remains to be seen.

If the funding is affected it will not be a precedent. Back in the late 1990s, then then minister for sport Jim McDaid withdrew funding from Swim Ireland over their mishandling of a number of child abuse scandals.

It is expected that Minister O’Donovan will write to SI in the coming days recommending that they take action as they see fit.

The IABA last night issued a statement saying that they sought several meetings with the Central Council to discuss the proposed new rules and governance but that the council “have not been available to meet”.