Michael Gallagher
MICHAEL Gallagher is through to the last sixteen at the World Youth Championships in Sofia.
The Finn Valley heavyweight overcame Canadian Evagelos Frangos in his opening bout at the Championships today in the Armeec Arena.
Gallagher won by a split decision in their round of 32 contest, with the powerful big Kinletter lad now set for a last sixteen fight on Easter Sunday. Gallagher was well in control of the bout and the only surprise was that he hadn’t been given a unanimous decision.
Gallagher took a technical count in the first round of this encounter after he called for some attention for a nose bleed, but he was the dominant force through the contest.
His win tees him up for a meeting with Great Britain’s Connal McDonald, who scored a unanimous win over Australian Paul Kovacs.
McDonald, a Scot, is one of nine British fighters in Sofia.
Gallagher, a ten-time Irish champion, won a bronze medal at the 2010 European Schoolboy Championships (also in Bulgaria) and has been in training with the Irish team over the last couple of months.
He won a bronze at the VII International Youth Tournament, the ‘Nikolay Pavlyukov Memorial’, in Anapa, back in February and will be aiming to advance from Sunday’s meeting with McDonald.
The World Youth Championships are the only qualifier for the Youth Olympics, to be held in August in the city of Nanjing in China.
The Irish had four wins from four today with Willie Donoghue, Ciara Ginty and Christina Desmond also winning their bouts.
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