Price and Jeffries have to settle for bronze

By Craig Phillips: Both David Price and Tony Jeffries will have to settle for Olympic bronze medals after they both lost their semi-final bouts at the Workers Gymnasium in Beijing this afternoon.

Jeffries came to the ring to face Irish captain Kenneth Egan, looking to follow in the footsteps of team-mate James DeGale who earlier in the day had overcome his Irish opponent Darren Sutherland.

Like the earlier bout the first round was close and both men were a little tentative to begin with.

But in the second round Egan took control of the bout and stretched the lead to three points by the halfway stage.

Egan always looked like having the edge over the Sunderland light heavyweight and controlled the fight, at times even looking like he was giving a boxing lesson in there.

Jeffries will be more than happy with his bronze medal but may look back on this semi-final and think how he may have benefited from coming out in the opening round at a higher tempo.

Egan eventually won by a score of 10-3 and will now look to become the first Irish boxer since Michael Carruth to win an Olympic gold when he goes in the final on Sunday.

Jeffries defeat left only David Price as the last semi-finalist as he came up against reigning world champion Roberto Cammarelle of Italy.

It was always going to be a tough ask but with a good start he may have caught the Italian off guard and pulled off a massive victory. But it was clear from the opening bell that the Italian was too much for the big scouse boxer.

Cammarelle landed big shots in the opening session, including a left hook which stunned Price and forced a standing eight count from the referee. Cammarelle held a 5-0 advantage after the opening round.

Things didn’t get any better in the second round as Cammerelle added four points to his tally before a straight left landed flush and sank Price into the ropes. Price rose quickly but the referee deemed that there was no point in continuing the bout and stopped the action with 50 seconds left in the second round.

Price and Jeffries can be proud of their achievements and regardless of how middleweight James DeGale gets on in the final tomorrow Team GB will know that their three medals equals the amount won by the British boxing team at the last four Olympics combined.