Baku Update: Taylor fights on; McComb finishes with bronze medal
Katie Taylor has scored a countback victory over Yana Alekseevna of Azerbaijan in her lightweight semi-final at the European Games boxing in Baku.
All three judges scored the fight as a 38-all tie, with Taylor behind by one round on two judges' cards going into the final round.
Split decision win for @KatieTaylor means she will fight now for a gold medal @BakuGames2015, congrats Katie! pic.twitter.com/N4tDxXjlxB
— Inpho Photography (@Inphosports) June 26, 2015
A tight encounter saw the split decision go Taylor's way, and she will fight for gold against Estelle Mossely in tomorrow's final at 2pm Irish time.
But Ireland’s second bronze has been confirmed, with Sean McComb losing to top-ranked Azeri Albert Selimov in the men's lightweight semis on a unanimous points decision.
Belfast fighter McComb had gone in strongly, but all three judges awarded Selimov the opening round.
When the 22-year-old Irishman suffered a cut to the side of his right eye, problems began to mount, and not even the awarding of the third round to McComb by two of the judges could prevent a 3-0 points decision.
Selimov was awarded the victory 29-28 30-27 29-28.
There’s one more semi-final with Irish interest coming up as Maxim Koptyakov is the opposition for Portlaoise’s Michael O’Reilly in the middleweight semi-finals at 10am Irish time.
Chloe and Sam Magee have secured a medal by qualifying for the mixed doubles semi-finals as badminton looks set to supply Ireland with more silverware.
The Magee siblings dispatched Pawel Pietryja and Aneta Wojtkowska 21-18 21-12 in 32 minutes.
Sam and Josh Magee are aiming for a spot in the men’s doubles final when they face Vladimir Ivanov and Ivan Sozonov of Russia at 3pm, already having secured at least a bronze medal.
Scott Evans has a semi-final in the men’s singles against Emil Holst of Denmark at 10am.
Eoin Fleming is out of the men’s judo having lost in the first round to Hasan Vanlioglu of Turkey.
Ben Doyle won his heat of the 100 butterfly in the pool this morning, but was disqualified as none of the Irish progressed.
Danielle Hill was the highest placed Irish swimmer this morning as she finished 21st overall in the 100m Backstroke, she missed out on a place in the semi-final by just .6 of a second. Hill was over a second off her Irish junior record time of 1:03.72 touching in 1:05.49. Issie Hayes was also off her best time in the event touching in 1:06.18.
Rory McEvoy was also six tenths of a second off a semi-final place in the heats of the 50m Backstroke, he swam a time of 27.34 seconds while Alan Corby (27.43) also competed.
James Brown swam a personal best time in the heats of the 100m Butterfly clocking 56.33 seconds, Brown was the fastest of three Irish swimmers placing 32nd overall. Alan Corby was fifth in his heat in 57.91 seconds and Doyle was disqualified having touched first in his heat.
In the men’s 100m Breaststroke Andrew Moore swam a lifetime best 1:07.51 while in the women’s event Mona McSharry (1:13.20) and Niamh Kilgallen (1:14.03) could not match their best times placing 22nd and 26th.
Hill, Hayes (27.69), McSharry (27.59) and Rachel Bethel (27.51) all competed in the heats of the 50m Freestyle with Hill the best of the Irish in 27.25 seconds.
