COMMONWEALTH GAMES medallist Alanna Audley-Murphy has admitted she is considering boycotting this year’s Ulster Senior Championships after her brother was controversially overlooked for a place on a Northern Ireland youth squad.
Holy Trinity welterweight Lewis Crocker was named in high performance coach John Conlan’s proposed panel for next month’s Commonwealth Youth Games, but the Ulster Council opted to send Oak Leaf’s Brett McGinty to Samoa instead. The decision shocked many in the local boxing community, as Crocker would have been the most experienced – and most decorated – member of the five-man team.
The whole episode has left a sour taste for Audley-Murphy and her family, and the three-time Ulster champion admits she has plenty of thinking to do before deciding whether or not to enter this year’s seniors.
“This has sickened me,” she said.
“At the minute, I’m thinking ‘why would I go back and enter the seniors after what they did to my brother?’ I’m totally disgusted with the Ulster Council. It’s not just that Lewis was the only one of the five nominations that wasn’t proposed and seconded, but the fact no-one else there had the minerals to speak up and say, ‘listen, this is unfair’ is even more disappointing.
“I’ve been fortunate enough to have been given the opportunity to represent my country on the international stage, and I just feel that same opportunity has been unfairly taken away from Lewis. I haven’t decided what to do yet. It might be a bit harder for me now if I did come back and enter because I’ve probably upset a few people but, at the end of the day, I’m Lewis’ big sister.”
Audley-Murphy’s fellow Commonwealth Games medallists Seán McGlinchey and Joe Fitzpatrick only ended up in Glasgow last summer because they won box-offs against Pádraig McCrory and Seán McComb respectively. Those box-offs were ordered by the Ulster Council, and Audley-Murphy is angry Crocker wasn’t afforded the same opportunity.
She continued: “It’s not Brett’s fault but, if they’re as closely matched as everybody is saying, then why not put them in a ring and see for ourselves? They did it last year, so why not for Lewis?
“The fact that they wouldn’t give him a box-off is the hardest thing to digest. I was told that, on the night of the Ulster Council meeting, when a box-off was mentioned, somebody said ‘are you going to put a ring up for one fight?’ You’re talking about a major chance to go away and represent Northern Ireland here. That kind of opportunity doesn’t come about every day and that has been taken away from Lewis.”
With the Northern Ireland panel heading Down Under next Tuesday for a two-week training camp at Canberra’s Australian Institute of Sport ahead of the Games (September 5-11), the Crocker camp know it is too late in the day for anything to change.
Despite travelling with the Northern Ireland team to Russia earlier this month, Audley-Murphy knows the hopes of a box-off at this stage are nil. But she hopes the level of publicity her brother’s case has received will lead the Ulster Council to review their procedures in future.
She said: “We know Lewis won’t get to go now but, if this whole thing means it doesn’t happen again to some other kid, then at least some good will have come out of it.
“I know myself, boxers train so hard and then it’s ultimately left in the hands of a board of other people to decide whether you go or not. It doesn’t seem right and something needs to change.”
The Ulster Council refused to comment on the matter on Monday night.
