Even three bronze medals in Beijing will not be good enough for the British team, says Glenn McCrory.
Disappointing to date, but British blushes can be spared
It's been a fantastic Olympic Games for Great Britain so far, but from a boxing perspective I have to be honest and say I've been disappointed.
Yes, as I write this we are assured of at least two bronzes and might well get a third medal, but I can't help but be a little bit underwhelmed with it all.
Of course David Price, Tony Jeffries and hopefully James DeGale have done fantastically well but from the moment Frankie Gavin failed to make the weight, I think that set the tone for what has followed.
Frankie was the standard bearer for the team, the one they were looking to for inspiration but to be honest it was a right shambles. I know he struggles with the weight, but surely it should've been sorted out long before they got to Macau.
They might be boxing as amateurs out in China, but make no mistake, this British team has very, very good funding. More, I reckon, than the swimmers, the cyclists and the sailors. That should mean the right people are brought in to do the right job - and that should've meant avoiding the mess that we got with Gavin.
These are not poor lads scraping by. These are practically full-time pros we are talking about here and that is what makes the performances and results in Beijing so disappointing - so far at least.
Failure
We need the three still left in to bring back a gold, or at least a silver amongst them, or these games and all the planning will have been a failure.
And to be fair, I think we have got a chance.
I was not overly-impressed with Jeffries' start to the tournament but as I said in my preview, the thing about this lad is, he finds a way to win. He looked much better against Imre Szello in his quarter-final and will need to be at his best to get more than a bronze when he goes in against Ireland's Kenny Egan.
I think Price has got a real chance though even though he is up against the world champion, Roberto Cammarelle. I watched him the other day and was not impressed at all. Maybe we have another super-heavyweight gold medal waiting to go with Audley's from eight years ago.
I did feel sorry for my mate Bradley Saunders though, because he didn't get the best of luck from the judges. And I do think he was harshly treated by the media afterwards as well. It was made out that Bradley didn't want to be in Beijing in the first place, but I can assure you that couldn't be further from the truth.
The point he was making was that there was so much pressure, so much expectation on the eight lads going out there that there was almost a tinge of relief that it was all over when he lost.
Of course he was devastated, as were all the lads, but what he meant to say was that the removal of that pressure goes some way to easing the pain of defeat. I know no-one would've been more upset not to be bringing back a medal than Bradley Saunders.
Mind you, Great Britain are not the only ones who have had a tough time of it. Russia and the former Soviet states were expected to take home an almighty medal haul but they have been going out left, right and centre.
Even China - who I still think are going to be massive in boxing - have not done as well as expected. We usually say in boxing you've got to knock the guy out to get a draw when you're away, but not for the poor Chinese - they have had no help from the judges whatsoever.
But they are fairly new to the Olympic boxing scene, Great Britain are not. We got a silver medal in Athens, a gold in Sydney and we've got a long way to go before we can consider Beijing an improvement on that...
