St Mary’s boxer Grainne Walsh receiving her medal at the tournament Photo by Andy Chubb
Grainne claims a bronze medal after great campaign
TALLAGHT BC and Team Ireland’s Grainne Walsh will come home from the World Boxing Championships in Liverpool with a bronze medal after a great campaign.
She contested her 65kg semi-final on Monday against Kazakhstan’s Aida Abikeyeva.
This was a high-tempo, close quarters bout and the 5-0 decision went to Abikeyeva.
Judges scored the bout: 28:29, 28:29, 28:29, 28:29, 27: 30, showing the hair’s breadth margin between these two athletes.
Abikeyeva is a 2025 World Boxing Cup champion, the 2024 Asian champion, and an IBA World champion.
Grainne carved her path to the semi-finals with a resounding Last 32 stage win over Jessica Triebelova of Slovakia, where she was dominant, coming away with a 5-0 win.
She boxed a masterful contest at the Last 16 stage against Mariana Soto Torres of Spain, and a second unanimous decision.
The Offaly woman claimed her bronze medal by defeating the Paris Olympics silver medalist China’s Yang Liu 3-2.
These championships are the first since 2015 in which Ireland has won 3 world medals at a single tournament with Aoife O’Rourke winning gold along with Patsy Joyce getting a bronze.
And Grainne? What can I say? I think everyone has had a glimpse of her talent, her drive and her humility over the last 10 days.
‘She’s a superb talent and, as she has said herself, she’s announced herself on the World stage, and this is where she belongs.” – Jon Mackey, High Performance Director and Team Ireland World Boxing Championships Team Manager.
“It’s 10 years since Team Ireland brought home three medals from the World Championships – 2015, 10 years ago in Doha when Michael Conlan won the gold.
‘It’s been 8 years since we won a Men’s World medal, and that went to Patsy’s cousin, Rio Olympian Joe Ward.
‘We finished joint 5th in the medal table out of 66 federations, equaling Cuba and ahead of powerhouses like Ukraine, the USA and Azerbaijan.
‘That’s where we need to be – we’ve laid down a marker among the traditionally dominant nations, but we can surpass that. – Mackey on the significance of Ireland’s placements at the World Championships.
Mackey also touched on the future plans for Irish boxing ahead of future events such as the LA Olympics in 2028.
“While there are a lot of positives to take from this tournament which bode well for 2026 and further into our LA cycle, we still have some work to do. Not one of our boxers looked out of place in the ring, but we need to invest more time and resources into competition.
‘We’ve had an unusual year, with a low level of competitive action. That’s partly down to our joining of World Boxing in Quarter Two.
‘WB’s calendar for 2026 is out in the next couple of weeks. That will allow us to plan to compete at as many World Boxing Cups as possible and to create individualized training and competition plans for each boxer.
‘The training at the high-performance unit is outstanding, its world class, but you can never simulate real world competition environments without actually being at them”.
