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Irish Mirror
Irish Mirror
Sport
Oisin Doherty

Kellie Harrington, Caitlin Fryers and Aoife O'Rourke through to gold medal fights

Kellie Harrington, Caitlin Fryers and Aoife O'Rourke will all fight for gold medals at European Boxing Championships on Saturday.

All three women along with Amy Broadhurst and Tina Desmond won their semi-final bouts on Friday and in the process secured silver medals at least.

Fryers was the first fighter out in the evening session and got Ireland off to a dream start. The Belfast star controlled the action throughout and pushed the pace for all three rounds. All five judges gave Fryers a much-deserved win.

READ MORE: 'Ireland's loss, India's gain' says Kellie Harrington as Bernard Dunne named India's new Boxing guru

Next up was Kellie Harrington. No stranger to the big occasion, the Tokyo Olympic Champion bossed proceedings and picked up a unanimous win without any major fuss.

While her opponent Donjeta Sadiku tried to force the issue and put Kellie under pressure, Ireland's gold medal hero couldn't be flustered. The Dubliner stayed calm throughout, got her opponents timing down to a tee and picked her shots when the opportunity presented itself.

O'Rourke was the last fighter out and she did brilliantly to defeat Love Holgersson of Sweden. O'Rourke was ultra aggressive throughout the fight and constantly looked to put her much taller opponent on the back foot.

The Swede took the first round on three of the judges scorecards. O'Rourke however recovered superbly and dominated the final two stanzas to progress to tomorrow's final.

Harrington, Fryers and O'Rourke and will join Amy Broadhurst and Tina Desmond in gold medal matchups tomorrow.

While the day ended on a high, Team Ireland got off to a nightmare start in the early afternoon session. Shannon Sweeney was defeated in a tight contest in the first fight of the day, while Michaela Walsh came up just short against Irma Testa of Italy, the same woman that defeated her in last year's Olympics.

But Sweeney and Walsh won't go home empty handed having already secured bronze medals with wins earlier in the week. Harrington, Fryers and O'rourke winning gold tomorrow would cap off a historic week for Team Ireland, who have already surpassed the team's previous record medal haul of three at the 2019 Championships, by winning seven medals this week.

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