Grainne Walsh is one step away from booking her place at the Paris Olympics after a totally dominant display over Kenya's Anyango Friza Asiko at the qualification tournament in Busto Arsizio, Italy.
With hands far too quick for her opponent, Walsh sent the Kenyan boxer to the canvas in the first with Asika also having to come through a standing eight count at the end of the second in a very one-sided contest.
Asiko needed something special in the final round of this 66kg contest to send the Irish fighter home, but it was more of the same with Walsh landing some clean efforts and getting away a series of body shots when her opponent tried to tie her up.
Many fighters would have stayed out of trouble in that final round given the gap on the scorecards, but Walsh wanted to attack and did so with each to secure a unanimous 5-0 win.
Walsh will return to ring on Monday where she will face Poland’s Aneta Rygielska who earned a 4-1 win over Natalya Bogdanova of Kazakhstan.
Earlier, Martin McDonagh's hopes of booking an Olympic ticket came to an end following a split-decision loss to Bahrain’s Danis Latypov.
The Galway youngster had caught the eye in the early rounds, but came out on the wrong side of a 3-2 decision on Saturday afternoon with another qualification tournament to come in May in Bangkok.
The first round in the 92kg contest went well for McDonagh, a number of early head combinations building confidence before he rocked the Russian born Latypov back with a stiff right at the halfway stage.
Latypov recovered well, the southpaw picking holes through McDonagh’s rear-guard, to take the first round 3-2.
The Bahrain man started the second round strongly, landing cleanly off both sides, but McDonagh’s power combos were still causing him issues as the round progressed.
That impressed the judges and going into the last was all to play for with Latypov up in one and the scores level on four other scorecards.
An early right to the body caused Latypov to grimace in the third, but he came off the ropes well and his accuracy was impressive.
McDonagh has shown real character at the E-Work Arena all week though and he unleashed a barrage of punches in the final minute to leave his opponent looking uncomfortable, but the decision went against him by the narrowest of margins.
