Moate's Joe ranked as world's number two

Seventeen-year-old Joe Ward from the Moate Boxing Club is allocated second place in the current world boxing rankings behind Russian Egor Mekhontsev. Mekhontsev won the gold medal at the 2009 World Championships and was Ward's predecessor as champion of Europe. Mekhontsev did not compete at the recent European Elite Championships where Ward defeated his compatriot Nikita Ivanov in the final. Ivanov is ranked 14th in the latest list. A familiar name to those who have followed Joe Ward's boxing career is Australian Damien Hooper. Hooper is ranked fourth in the World in the latest list. It was Hooper who lost to Joe Ward in the final of the AIBA World Youth Championships and it was also Hooper who defeated Ward in the Youth Olympics in Singapore where Ward broke a bone in his hand in the first round. The only Irish boxer with a higher ranking than Joe Ward is the phenomenal Katie Taylor who continues to lead the way in the ladies world rankings, a ranking she has held since November 2006. Ward has just returned from a training camp with the Irish Elite squad in Assisi, Italy. The preliminary rounds of 2011 AIBA World Championships and Olympic qualifiers begin in Baku on September 26. The value of the high performance unit in Irish boxing is evident when we look at the experience Joe Ward has gained on his many trips to Baku where he has collected four gold and one silver medal in the various competitions which the IABA has sent him to compete in over the years. This will give him a great advantage as he competes against boxers with greater senior boxing experience but who will not feel as familiar with the surroundings as Ward who considers Baku as a boxing home away from home.