BURY Amateur Boxing Club is punching above its weight, according to coach Mick Jelley, after young protégé Muhammad Ali qualified for the British Olympic team.
The 19-year-old flyweight won gold at last weekend’s European qualification event, awarded unanimous verdicts in each of his four fights.
Ali, who travels from Keighley in West Yorkshire to train with Jelley, followed in the footsteps of Bury ABC’s most famous son, Amir Khan, who won silver at the 2004 Games in Athens.
“There are around 90 amateur boxing clubs in the North West region and I think only five of them have ever had a boxer make it to the Olympics,” he said.
“It is a fantastic honour for such a small club as ours to achieve something like this.
“I have been in this game for 55 years and had two Olympians. I never expected one, so to get two is an unbelievable feeling.”
Ali needed to finish in the top three at the event in Samsun, Turkey, to claim one of the 32 flyweight spots at the Rio Games.
He beat fighters from Hungary and Ukraine to make the semi-finals, then earned a 3-0 verdict against Daniel Asenov, of Bulgaria, to qualify.
It was sweet revenge for the teenager, who lost to Asenov in the final of the European Championships last year.
Ali then went on to clinch gold with victory over Armenian Narek Abgaryan in the final.
Ali won the English Elite Championships last April in only his fourth senior fight, but has struggled since suffering a deep cut above his eye following a clash of heads at the European Games.
The cut reopened to stop his progress at the World Championships in Doha, where he had hoped to seal his place at the Olympics.
But Ali put off an operation to fix the problem in a bid to make the plane to Rio.
And after registering a couple of victories for the British Lionhearts in the World Series of Boxing he finally clinched his spot in the British team with an accomplished display in Sofia.
The teenager took to Twitter to celebrate his achievement.
“It’s all paid off, I can’t believe it,” read one tweet from his official address @malijnr1996
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