Jeffries scraps through

British light-heavyweight Tony Jeffries edged a scrappy opening fight of his campaign to move within a victory of an Olympic medal in Beijing.

Jeffries had to wait what will have seemed like an age to finally get into the ring after receiving a first round bye, and it was far from pretty when he did get in on the action.

The Sunderland 25-year-old was leading Colombia's Eleider Alvarez by a point with just 15 seconds of the fight remaining when he was caught by the South American, who ensured a 5-5 draw.

The contest then went to a countback of the ringside judges' scores, and it was the Team GB man who got the nod and moved into the semi-finals.

Scrap

Jeffries admitted that it was a scrap against the Colombian, but was nevertheless thrilled with setting up a tie with Hungarian fighter Imre Szello in the last eight - with the winner guaranteed at least a bronze.

"I've only ever dreamed of winning an Olympic medal since I was six years old, and I'm so close now," said Jeffries, who beat his next opponent by a point in the EU Championships in Poland in June.

"You never know how the countback score is going to go and I was praying to God to let me win.

"There was a lot of pressure on me because the Olympics is the biggest sporting event going and it has been a long week for me.

"With the rest of the team doing so well that added to the pressure."

Wide open

The light-heavyweight division is now wide open after Thailand's Non Boonjumnong was stunned by Egypt's Hosam Abdin, while Russia's struggles continued as the well-backed Artur Beterbiev lost 8-2 against China's Zhang Xiaoping.

Irishman Kenneth Egan joined Jeffries in the last eight though, with a 10-2 win over Turkey's Bahram Muzaffer.

After receiving criticism following a poor showing at the World Championships in Chicago, Irish fighters are now 4-0 in Beijing.

"It's a brilliant start to the team especially after what happened in Chicago last year," said Egan.

"There were a lot of people talking bad about us, about how the training camp was a disaster and the high-performance programme was no good and there's too much training being done. It's all a load of rubbish."