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10/09/2007
Bootless Degale wins gold
75kg Gavril Ronald (ROM) lost to James Degale (5:15)
The early signs were not good for James who faced a local favourite. His boots were stolen the night before the fight; he had to borrow a team mate's boots that were 1.5 sizes too big. Furthermore, given the standard of the scoring this week, two boxers were withdrawn before their finals against Romanian opponents and another was pulled out at the end of the third as the final day threatened to descend into farce.
Remarkably James retained his composure throughout and produced another high class performance to claim gold. To be fair to the officials this bout was not plagued by the inconsistencies of previous bouts.
The first round was the least eventful, perhaps because the Romanian didn't come forward as anticipated, and James was happy to probe rather than try and dominate. Still he managed to assert his authority early on (1:2).
James pulled away in the second boxing excellently in the process. He caught the Romanian with a lovely straight backhand long right hook combination (2:6). At the start of the third Degale allowed the Romanian to come forward catching him with a series of accurate and powerful counters. He then switched to offence firing in trademark uppercuts and bolos. The Romanian had little response (3:11).
With the gap now insurmountable Degale protected his lead well in the final round covering up well when pinned on the ropes on a couple of occasions. His superior hand speed and reflexes allowing him to catch the Romanian as he tried in vain to rouse the home crowd.
An excellent tournament for Degale who picks up another Gold to add to his collection.
Terry Edwards said that he was pleased with the form of the squad, who collected 6 medals from their team of 10, adding that it bodes well for the forthcoming World Championships in Chicago in mid-October.
The medal table below demonstrates a solid performance by a team who were short of the injured David Price (+91kg) and Frankie Gavin (60kg), both of whom are expected to be fully fit soon and who travelled with the team to train, spar, support teammates and watch opponents.
The team was ably supported by English Institute of Sport practitioners Mike Plush (physio), Richard Chessor (nutritionist) and Rob Gibson (performance analyst).
All medallists with GB Coaches Terry Edwards, Nigel Davies and Dave Pocknell.
Medal Table
Country
Gold
Silver
Bronze
Total
Romania
3
4
3
10
France
4
1
2
7
Great Britain
1
0
5
6
Germany
1
1
2
4
Hungary
1
1
2
4
Russia
0
1
2
3
Bulgaria
0
1
1
2
Poland
0
1
1
2
Greece
1
0
0
1
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