Ireland's boxers failed to grab their first chances at qualification for this summer's Olympic Games after both flyweight Brendan Irvine and lightweight David Oliver Joyce followed up Katie Taylor's defeat by losing their semi-finals at the European Olympic Qualifiers in Turkey on Friday.
Belfast flyweight Irvine suffered a unanimous points defeat to Armenia’s Narek Abgarayan before Joyce went down on a similar verdict to Britain’s Joe Cordina.
Irvine will now aim to win a box-off against Bulgaria's Daniel Asenov, who lost the second semi-final to Britain's Muhammad Ali. Joyce will meet Turkey's Volkon Goycek after he lost his bout to the top-ranked French lightweight Sofiane Oumiha.
If required, both boxers will have further chances to earn an Olympic place at the world qualifying event in June.
There was a cagey opening to Irvine’s fight as both fighters avoided close combat before the bout started to open up late in the first round.
Abgarayan’s tactics revolved around a swinging left and some strong over the top right hands and the 24-year-old from Yerevan did enough to take the round from all three judges.
Irvine worked hard to land his shots in the second round, but again his Armenian opponent struck with the more decisive shots to make it another clean sweep on the scorecard.
Irvine finished strongly, landing a number of good combinations on Abgarayan in the final round, including a flurry of punches to the face of his opponent who seemed to drop his guard as if he thought the bout had ended.
When the bell finally arrived, two of the three judges awarded the final round to Irvine before Abgarayan’s hand was lifted in victory by the referee.
Third seed Joyce lost the first round of his bout against second-seeded Cordina, whose precise glovework got him past the Athy boxer’s guard.
The second round looked like it might run in the favour of Joyce, who landed two strong right hands to the Welshman’s face, but he got the decision from just one of the three judges.
Knowing he had to score strongly, Joyce went on the offensive from the the start of the final round, but despite winning the round, the result went Cordina’s way on a unanimous verdict.
