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Barnes: second bronze for Ireland
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Ireland's Paddy Barnes was forced to settle for a bronze medal in the light flyweight after being outclassed by China's Zou Shiming.
But the scoring system was once again reduced to farce as the judges decided that Barnes did not land a scoring shot, despite connecting cleanly with Zou on a number of occasions.
The semi-final bout finished 15-0 in favour of the home boxer, and although Barnes can count himself unlucky not to register a single point, the Chinese was much the better throughout the contest.
Barnes' bronze medal is the second for Ireland's boxers after Darren Sutherland was beaten in his middleweight semi-final by Great Britain's James Degale earlier on Friday, while Kenny Egan fights another Brit, Tony Jeffries, in the light heavyweight division later tonight.
China have never won a boxing gold at the Olympics.
Zou, who gave China their first Olympic medal with a bronze in 2004 in Athens and went on to become their first world champion last year in Chicago, will meet Mongolia's Serdamba Purevdorj in Sunday's final.
Furious
Despite exceeding expectations simply by qualifying for the Games, the 21-year-old from Belfast was furious with the scoring of his contest.
Barnes said: "I got beat fair and square but the judging was terrible. There's no way I lost 15-0. I hit him with clean shots. The way the judging is out here, it should be the judges being drug-tested, not the fighters.
"I don't care about the Olympic medal. They can keep it for all I care. Bronze is for losers."
