2024-04-19 12:25:04
Since the regaining of independence, the Lithuanian Boxing Federation, which had its athletes in all the Olympics up to that point, watched the battles of the Tokyo Games unhappily – none of our boxers were in them.
“Not everything is simple here. It was not the case that our people did not make it through the selection for the Olympics. As you know, there was both the coronavirus pandemic and problems with the International Boxing Federation (IBA), – said Darius Šaluga, president of the Lithuanian Boxing Federation. – The Olympic committee invited all the boxers to Tokyo according to the ratings invented at that time.
They were more mystical – you had to collect points somewhere, and no one organized qualifying tournaments. If they had happened, I guarantee that at least two Lithuanians would have taken those passports.”
However, this time the International Olympic Committee (IOC), which has taken over the selection from the IBA, is organizing two boxing competitions, during which they distribute 124 invitations to the men’s and women’s Olympic tournaments.
Part of the invitations were distributed during the European and Asian championships, the African selection and the Pan American Games.
The last tickets to Paris were to go to the best boxers of two world selection tournaments: from March 3 to 12, the first such tournament took place in Busto Arsicius, Italy, and the second will be held from May 23 to June 3 in Bangkok, the capital of Thailand.
Lithuanian boxers still only dream of winning tickets to the Games, because the first tournament ended in vain for our people.
Ana Starovoitova, who fought in the weight category up to 60 kg, Gabrielė Stonkutė, who competed up to 75 kg, and men – Andriejus Lavrenovas (up to 63.5 kg), Aleksandras Trofimčiuks (up to 71 kg), Robertas Liorančas (up to 80 kg), Darius Voishnarovičius (up to 92 kg) or Jonas Jazevičius (over 92 kg) failed to cross the limit that would guarantee Olympian status.
All these athletes could perhaps test themselves once again at the last Olympic selection tournament in Thailand, but after receiving extremely severely cut state funding, the Lithuanian Boxing Federation decided to send only 3 or 4 athletes to Bangkok.
The National Sports Agency (NSA) has decided to allocate a little more than 416,000 to boxers in the country according to the 2024 funding model for high-performance sports programs. euros – that’s 24.5 percent. less than what was repaid in 2023.
“I’m not even afraid to say it out loud – the authorities simply cheated us during the Olympic years,” said the guide of the country’s boxing federation. – We believed in beautiful speeches about the need to boycott competitions with Russian and Belarusian aggressors, we believed in the declarations that funding due to non-participation in such championships and unwon places will not affect the future allocated money.
We boycotted two European and three world championships in which boxers from Russia, which started the war in Ukraine, competed. And? Now it is explained that if certain places in the international arena are not won, there is no necessary funding.
Everything passes with morality and former declarations. On the other hand, it is our own fault that we believed the words of sports officials, which were just empty chatter.”
The federation promises to send G.Stonkutė, A.Trofimčiuk and J.Jazevičius to Thailand for one more attempt to snatch travel tickets to the Olympics.
And he is thinking about the participation of one of the country’s best boxers, Eimantas Stanionis, in the selection.
It is true that the 29-year-old Kaunian will defend the WBA welterweight world champion belt in a fight with 37-year-old Gabriel Maestre from Venezuela on May 4 in Las Vegas.
“That’s the main catch. No one knows how that fight will end – whether Eimantas, God forbid, will not be injured or will be able to recover.
After all, the difference between both competitions is only a couple of weeks. We hope that he will be in Thailand, but you have to understand that he can also have a 12-round fight in Las Vegas,” said D. Šaluga.
Another failure of Lithuanians to enter the Olympic Games would be a considerable blow to the entire Lithuanian boxing system.
True, only Evaldas Petrauskas has won a medal since the Independence Day Games, who took third place at the 2012 London Olympics.
– One more qualifying tournament remains. However, will there be a male or female boxer in the Lithuanian Olympic team in Paris? – lrytas.lt asked D. Šaluga.
– I think that everywhere in the boxing gyms from now on it is necessary to write in big letters “a year spent without fights is a failure of mastery”.
As I have already said, due to the participation of Russian athletes in international competitions, which caused the war, we refused to compete in both European and World Championships.
We didn’t go anywhere and that basically not only demoralized the boxers but also undermined their skill. Let’s say, in the selection in Italy, G.Stonkutė had to deal with her rivals without any major problems, but she lost to an opponent whom she had easily defeated before.
It all comes together – both psychology and the loss of experience: when you don’t box, the curve can’t go up by itself. I hope that there will be a passport, but that dream is somewhat pessimistic. We learned wrongly – from our own mistakes, not from other people’s mistakes.
– Will it be a certain tragedy for Lithuanian boxing if our country does not have a boxer in the games for the second Olympics in a row?
– You know, this is not something that can turn into a tragedy. One of the oldest Olympic sports is planned to be removed from the 2028 Los Angeles Games. This will be a tragedy for the entire boxing world.
Although this is not declared or already legalized in the charter of the International Olympic Committee, it is seriously talked about behind the scenes, as if it is already a fact. Of course, it’s not until it’s made public, but there’s no boxing on the program for the Los Angeles Games just yet.
Such a deletion would be the beginning of the downfall of this sport. You yourself understand that all countries support the Olympic sports more, they are allocated funding, and the non-Olympic ones follow and try to bury themselves as best they can.
– The International Olympic Committee deprived the IBA of the right to organize Olympic selection and expelled this organization from its membership. Its leader, Russian politician and businessman Umar Kremliov, tried to return to the Olympic family through the courts, but failed. Don’t you think that boxing is being removed from the Olympic sport because of the IBA’s activities in supporting the aggressor boxers?
– This is more due to the past problems with non-transparent funding of boxing and the establishment of a criminal element in the international organization. Now these are the consequences of the activities carried out.
– Does Lithuania have connections with IBA?
– Our federation takes a strict position towards the IBA – Lithuanian boxers will never participate in competitions where Russians or Belarusians will fight.
And we will maintain this position, even though the language of our sports authorities has changed drastically over the years – when the Russians attacked Ukraine, we all agreed to boycott the aggressor, not to participate in competitions with him.
Now we hear the “distortion” of the authorities that maybe the athletes themselves have to decide with the federations whether to fight or not to fight with Russian athletes. This is such an unpleasant turn of the position.
As for the IBA, it is trying to lure and lure both Africa and half of Europe with Russian money. Founded the “Champions nicht” competition platform, which attracts boxers with large amounts of prize money.
Of course, the IBA is supported by the Russian state company Gazprom, and the champions are promised 1 million each. dollars. As an alternative to the IBA organization, the “Nord boxing” organization was created in Europe, but it has no muscles.
And we cannot contribute anything – because if we withdraw from IBA, we would lose state funding. Why? Because the National Sports Agency finances federations that are members of recognized international organizations.
The IBA, although Russian-run, still remains world-recognised, while Nord boxing is not. We are forced to stay in the IBA in order to develop boxing in Lithuania.
2024-04-19 12:25:04