Battling Quigley has to settle for second as classy Kazakh claims gold

He put in a herculean effort, but Jason Quigley had to settle for a World Championships silver medal after defeat to Kazakh opponent Zhanibek Alimkhanuly this morning.

Fighting in front of his home crowd, Alimkhanuly won on a unanimous decision on a 30-27, 30-27, 29-28 scoreline in the middleweight final after a very impressive display against the Donegal native, who suffered his first loss in 33 bouts. Quigley faced a standing count in the first round after tumbling onto the canvass, more from a loss of balance on Quigley’s part, but having been deemed to have lost the first round by all three judges, Quigley faced an uphill battle thereafter. Alimkhanuly, who didn’t have to contest the semi-final due to the withdrawal of Anthony Fowler through injury, looked the fresher fighter and with Quigley forced to chase the fight, all three judges scored the second round in favour of the Kazakh. It was going to take something special for Quigley to come out on top after that and although he did land a few decent punches in the third, there can be no complaints with the final result after an ultra-impressive display by his opponent. Quigley can still hold his head high after what has been a great tournament and although he didn’t win gold, he has still become the first male Irish fighter to win a silver medal at World Championships level. He’ll be back, no doubt about it.