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23/03/2009
England juniors' Polish adventure
A team of England juniors have just returned from Poland, where they took on the host nation. National coach Mick Gannon gave the following report...
Before the team set off for Poland, they gathered in Liverpool for a weekend training camp, with the aim of refreshing their skills with myself and coaches Paul Stevenson and Steve Gowran, (attending his first national training squad). The team gelled well and got in at least six quality rounds of sparring, as well as the technique and skills sessions covered.
Bouts
46kg Luqmaan Patel lost to Dawid Michelus
Luqmaan allowed his opponent to bully him for the first half of the bout. He had some success in the latter part, when he planted his feet and let the shots go, but most of his work involved single shots, while the Polish boxer always had a couple of extra shots for Patel. The judging was dne manually by three Polish judges, who all rightly voted for their boxer.
50kg Joe Costello drew against Grzegorz Brynda
Joe worked well against an awkward southpaw. As his opponet attacked, he threw combinations of three and four shots and seemed to be scoring well, but in the second round Joe was given a warning for holding. Although I believe he should have recieved the win, the Polish judges scored a draw.
52kg Qais Ahfaq beat Kazimierz Legowski
Qais had an excellent performance. He was composed throughout his bout and stuck to his game plan. His switching from orthodox to southpaw had great success - it confused his southpaw opponent and he ran out a comfortable winner.
54kg Chris Smith lost to Patryk Szymanski
Chris boxed the son of the vice president of the region's boxing association. Chris did not have the best of starts by trying to take the bout to his shorter opponent and being countered, but he listened to advice and sat back to give Szymanski the problem of getting past his much longer reach. I thought he had done enough in rounds two and three to get the nod. The decision went to his opponent.
57kg Ben Hall lost to Mateusz Batz
Ben started very nervously and for a lot of his work he was out of distance. He settled down half way through the bout and rocked his opponent a couple of times, but didn't follow through with a sustained attack, losing on points. Ben is relatively inexperienced but is one to watch for the future.
57kg Danny Craven lost to Rafel Perczynski
Danny started at a million miles an hour and, although he wasn't getting caught by his opponent, he wasn't landing shots with sufficient force because of his rapid movement. He could have quite a lot of success in his bout but his Polish opponent had a couple of cleaner shots on him. Points loss for Danny.
60kg Ben Jones drew with Syswester Stempniewski
Ben had a shorter opponent and started out with the wrong tactics, trying to take the bout to the Polish boxer. Back in the corner he listened to advice and sat back working the jab and letting his opponent make the mistake of jumping in, then punishing him with a straight back hand counter. He did this throughout the bout and looked a comfortable winner, but again the decision was a draw.
63kg Jack Reay lost to Adrian Plichta
Jack allowed Plichta to bully him in the first round and did not reply with hard enough shots to hurt his opponent. In the second and third round he did hit harder, but he only only threw single shots that weren't enough to keep his attacking opponent at bay, and losing him the bout on a points decision.
66kg John Coyle beat Mateusz Skowronski
John had the right attitude with his aggessive opponent. He met his attacker with force and after the initial on slaught he pushed Skowronski back with two-handed attacks, giving his opponent real problems. This continued throughout the very exciting bout, making John a clear winner and giving him best boxer of the night award.
70kg Wayne Ingram lost to Patryk Tolkaczewsk
Wayne met a very aggressive puncher who caught him with a peach of a shot near the end of the first round, giving him a well deserved count just before the bell. This woke Wayne up and from then on he kept the attack on his opponent, who could not do a lot on his back foot, with Wayne taking the steam out of him. However, the Polish judges saw it differently and gave the decision to their boxer.
Summary
The whole experience for the boxers was a learning curve. Each will take away a lot from this and it will give them something to work with back in their gyms at home. The team were excellent ambassadors for the ABAE, in both their exemplary behaviour and their conduct in the ring.
Coaches
Both coaches worked well together in assisting the team in their preparations to compete and should congratulated for this.