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Irish Mirror
Irish Mirror
Sport
Eamon Doggett

Joy for Ireland as Amy Broadhurst and Lisa O'Rourke both reach world championship finals

Ireland's Amy Broadhurst and Lisa O'Rourke will both fight for gold medals tomorrow after winning their IBA Women's World Boxing Championships semi-finals today.

The duo will both bid to join only Katie Taylor and Kellie Harrington as Ireland's world amateur champions.

Broadhurst was first of the two into the ring in Istanbul after reaching a world semi-final for the first time after four previous quarter-final losses.

But the Dundalk woman, 25, showed no signs of nerves as she tried to control the centre of the ring against her semi-final opponent Indian fighter Parveen.

Always looking to move forward, Broadhurst was the more powerful of the two and rocked her opponent with clean shots on a couple of occasions.

In an action-packed light welterweight fight, with both boxers throwing plenty of punches, Broadhurst seemed to tire in the third and final round.

But the Irish boxer managed to finish the round with a flourish and was awarded a 4:1 split decision victory on the judges' scorecards.

Amy Sara Broadhurst (Mehmet Eser/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)

She will take on Algeria's Imane Khelif in the final, who defeated Chelsey Heijnen of the Netherlands by an unanimous decision.

While Broadhurst is a veteran of five world championships, the surprise package of the Irish team has undoubtedly been Lisa O'Rourke.

The sister of Olympian Aoife O’Rourke, Lisa only turned 20 last weekend but could be the next start of Irish boxing based on her exploits in Istanbul this week.

Also member of Roscommon's senior football team, O'Rourke dominated Armenia’s Ani Hovsepyan in the quarter-finals to set up a clash with Turkey's Sema Caliskan.

On paper it looked like a tough assignment for O'Rourke, who hasn't won a national senior title yet, to take on a hometown fighter.

But from the opening bell she showed all her talent. The rangier of the two fighters, O'Rourke looked composed throughout and it was her opponent who was the cagier of the two.

Despite losing the opening round 3:2 on the judges' scorecards, the Roscommon woman bucked the legs of Caliskan in the second round.

This put her in command going into the final round, and O'Rourke didn't drop her pace on the way to a dominant unanimous 5:0 decision victory.

She will face Helena Panguane in the light middleweight decider after the Mozambique fighter defeated Valentina Khalzova of Kazakhstan.

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