Medal winners Aoife O’Rourke, Gráinne Walsh and Patsy Joyce took centre stage as Ireland’s 17-strong squad returned home from the World Boxing Championships in Liverpool on Monday evening.
O’Rourke’s victory in her 75kg final on Sunday marked the high point of the championships, while there were career-best performances and bronze medals for Walsh (65kg) and Joyce (55kg), who were both narrowly denied places in their respective finals.
Ireland had not won three medals at a single world tournament since 2015, when Mick Conlan became Ireland’s first male world champion, although that was the first time men and women fought in the same championships.
O’Rourke’s was also a first World Championship gold for Ireland since the 2022 edition, when her younger sister Lisa and Amy Broadhurst were both crowned champions.
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Speaking after her win over Turkey’s Busra Isildar in Sunday’s final bout, the new women’s middleweight champion said it was a “huge honour” to join her sister, Broadhurst, Conlan and Katie Taylor as Ireland’s fifth world champion.
“To have finished off with the gold medal is incredible. Liverpool has been so welcoming, we didn’t have far to travel, which is always a bonus,” she said.
O’Rourke added that the 2028 Olympics are her “end goal”, but she is focusing on making it to LA “one step at a time”.
Despite going into the final as favourite, having twice beaten Isildar in European competitions, O’Rourke’s dominance was a surprise, winning all three rounds on the three judges’ scorecards.
In the semi-finals, the 28-year-old had already proved her class, defeating former world and Asian champion Lina Wang comprehensively, as the Roscommon fighter appeared to have a significant fitness advantage over her competitors.
Walsh claimed Ireland’s first medal of the tournament in the welterweight division after losing a close semi-final by unanimous decision.
The 29-year-old had earlier produced an upset in defeating Olympic silver medallist Liu Yang in the quarter-finals thanks to a high-energy performance, confirming her place on the podium in the process.
Joyce had a sensational World Championships debut at bantamweight, as the 19-year-old defeated top-class opposition on his way to a bronze medal.
The Mullingar fighter beat Olympic bronze medallist Javier Ibanez Diaz before also upsetting the highly-favoured former world champion Mirazizbek Mirzakhalilov from Uzbekistan.
In the semi-final, Joyce was unfortunate to be on the wrong end of a 3-2 split decision, as Spanish 20-year-old Rafael Lozano Serrano advanced to the final by the narrowest of margins.
Ireland finished seventh on the medals table with Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan taking first and second respectively.
This was the first major tournament held by the new Olympic governing body, World Boxing, which was established to replace the International Boxing Association (IBA).
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) refused to recognise the IBA as a governing body beyond the 2024 Olympics and it appeared that the sport could be removed from the Games going forward.
However, in March 2025 it was announced that boxing would be renewed for the LA Games with World Boxing overseeing the sport at the Olympics.
