BBC pundit Matthew Pinsent hits out at dealing with of girls’s boxing row

BBC pundit and Olympic hero Matthew Pinsent has criticised the handling of the women’s boxing gender row by the game’s organisers.

Mr Pinsent, who won four gold medals in rowing from 1992 to 2004, said the International Olympic Committee (IOC) ran into problems as their policy ‘can’t have both equity and inclusion’.

The gender row has overshadowed the games after two athletes, Algeria’s Imane Khelif and Taiwan‘s Lin Yu-ting, won gold in boxing despite failing a gender test and being kicked out of the Boxing World Championships last year.

The sport’s international governing body that made the ruling, the Russia-dominated International Boxing Association (IBA), was then stripped of the right to run the Paris Games competition over corruption and governance issues.

But the row over the decision is believed to have played a considerable role in the decision by IOC president Thomas Bach to announce he will be resigning next year.

Now Mr Pinsent, 53, has waded into the controversy and said the IOC faces some ‘major challenges’ as it looks to move past the scandal.

He said live on BBC Sport tonight: ‘While Paris has been a huge success, there have been some very unfortunate headlines about boxing and the IOC in a sense asked for that because they stepped in and said we don’t like the way boxing is being run we are going to make the rules for the Olympics and the inclusion of athletes boxing here.

‘And that has basically exploded on them and it has been really unfortunate. 

‘It has been totally of their own creation as they can’t have both equity and inclusion. 

‘It is so so weird that they allowed it to happen, they can’t organise an event and say on the one hand we are just organising the Olympics and then on the other hand diving into a sport and saying we are also going to write the rulebook for boxing for Paris. 

‘That has been really unpleasant and unfortunate. The challenges going forward will be to sort that out for the new president we expect to be elected next year.’

Mr Bach’s summer has been dominated by questions over the IOC’s decision to allow Khelif and Yu-Ting to compete in this summer’s Olympics. 

But the Olympics president has remained steadfastly behind the decision and recently defended the right of both to box at the Games. 

Khelif was originally announced as Algeria’s flagbearer for the Closing Ceremony tonight, but it was changed at the last minute.

Khelif stormed to light-welterweight gold on Friday, while Lin Yu-ting, dominated her Chinese opponent in the featherweight final, just 24 hours later. 

It was claimed Khelif was a transgender athlete now competing in the women’s category, after she forced her first opponent, Italian Angela Carini, to quit in the opening stages of their contest.

She lasted just 46 seconds into the first round before she dropped to her knees, claiming it was to ‘save my life’.

Last year, the Algerian had been banned from progressing through last year’s World Championships, by the IBA, the sport’s international governing body.

Lin Yu-Ting, similarly, had failed an IBA gender test and was kicked out of the same World Championships.

However, inconsistencies in IBA testing protocols have been highlighted, as have the influence of the Russian contingent within its rank-and-file, who have taken a hardline against gender issues.

On Friday, Olympics chief Thomas Bach defended the right of both to box in Paris, but added that he would be the first to adopt an agreed ‘scientifically solid system’.’

‘This system is working and so therefore our decision is clear,’ he said. ‘Women should be allowed to take part in women’s competitions and the two are women. For now, victory is Khelif’s.’

Khelif, who took an instant call from the country’s president, also had a political message. ‘I want to tell the world that they should commit to the Olympic principles and they should not bully people,’ she said.

‘This is the message of the Olympics. I hope people stop bullying. We are in the Olympic to perform as athletes, to our families. I hope will not see any similar attacks in future.’

The IOC said in a statement last week: ‘These two athletes were the victims of a sudden and arbitrary decision by the IBA.

‘Towards the end of the IBA World Championships in 2023, they were suddenly disqualified without any due process.

‘According to the IBA minutes available on their website, this decision was initially taken solely by the IBA Secretary General and CEO.’

Some sports have limited the levels of testosterone allowed for athletes competing in women’s competition, while others ban everyone who has been through male puberty.

There is no evidence either woman had been through male puberty.

The IOC said the rules of eligibility were based on those of the Tokyo Games in 2021 and could not be changed during a competition.

The governing body added: ‘The IOC is saddened by the abuse that the two athletes are currently receiving. Every person has the right to practice sport without discrimination.’

The IOC said in a statement last week: ‘These two athletes were the victims of a sudden and arbitrary decision by the IBA.

‘Towards the end of the IBA World Championships in 2023, they were suddenly disqualified without any due process.

‘According to the IBA minutes available on their website, this decision was initially taken solely by the IBA Secretary General and CEO.’

Prior to 2021, the IOC set thresholds for the maximum amount of testosterone — the ‘male’ sex hormone — competitors in women’s events could have. These were picked up in blood tests, similar to ones for doping.

Rules on testosterone limits had been previously brought into sharp focus by the very public and famous case of Caster Semenya.

Semenya has a condition which means her body naturally produces higher levels of testosterone than normal for women.

She became unable to compete at Tokyo in 2020 after World Athletics brought in new rules independently of the IOC at the time.

IOC’s own testosterone monitoring policies were halted three years ago and replaced with a policy of ‘fairness, inclusion and non-discrimination on the basis of gender identify and sex variation’. 

The gender row first hit the headlines when Khelif—who also competed in the Tokyo Games—faced criticism following her bout with Italian boxer Angela Carini.

Within the first 30 seconds of their clash, Carini was hit in the face and went to her corner to have her headgear adjusted by her coach, with reports stating she had broken her nose.

Although she briefly continued, Carini barely threw a punch before telling her corner ‘it’s not fair’ and then abandoning the match ‘for her own safety’ – instantly dropping to her knees and crying.

‘I wasn’t able to finish the match. I felt a strong pain to my nose and I said [to myself] for the experience that I have and the maturity as a woman that I have, I said I hope my nation won’t take it badly, I hope my dad won’t take it badly – but I stopped, I said stop for myself,’ Carini told BBC Sport after the fight.

‘It could have been the match of a lifetime, but I had to preserve my life as well in that moment. I didn’t have fear, I don’t fear the ring. I don’t fear taking the blows. But this time there’s an end for everything, and I put an end to this match, because I wasn’t able to [continue].’

After the match was stopped, the referee raised Khelif’s hand in the air. But a visibly furious Carini yanked her own hand away from the fight official and walked off.

During the rapid fight, Carini was rocked by two punches from Khelif and said the savage force of the blows made it ‘impossible to continue’.

Ignoring the Algerian after calling a halt to the bout, the Italian fighter then plunged to her knees and burst into tears – later saying she said she had never felt such strong blows in a contest before.

Speaking after the match, the heartbroken Italian said: ‘I’m used to suffering. I’ve never taken a punch like that, it’s impossible to continue. I’m nobody to say it’s illegal.

‘I got into the ring to fight. But I didn’t feel like it anymore after the first minute. I started to feel a strong pain in my nose. I didn’t give up, but a punch hurt too much and so I said enough. I’m leaving with my head held high.’

She said she did not walk away from the fight as a protest against her opponent’s inclusion, but that was a decision for the Olympics to consider.

Asked why she knelt at the end of the match, she said it was for her late father, who died in 2021, before adding: ‘I am sorry not to have taken Italy on to the podium.’

She was taken away for medical assessment to examine the seriousness of her facial injuries which included a bruised nose.

Sex Matters’ Maya Forstater reacted with outraged emojis to a video of the conclusion of the bout, where a commentator quips ‘job done’.

Former elite marathon runner and two-time Olympian Mara Yamauchi further slated the fight on X, saying ‘shame on the IOC for allowing this’.

Khelif has attracted backlash with gold medal-winning Team GB boxer boxer Nicola Adams posting: ‘I stand wit Angela Carini’.

The trailblazer slammed the decision to let the fight go ahead as ‘unfair and dangerous’.

She said: ‘After years of fighting for women’s boxing to even exist in the Olympics and then all the training they go through to get there it was hard to watch another fighter be forced [to] give up on her Olympic dreams.

‘People not born as biological women, that have been through male puberty should not be able to complete [sic] in women’s sport. Not only is this unfair it’s dangerous!’

There is no evidence or claim that either athletes have been through male puberty. The pair were ruled ineligible after they ‘failed to meet eligibility rules, following a test conducted by an independent laboratory’.

Sex Matters director of campaigns Fiona McAnena said the International Olympic Committee, which oversees the Games, should be ‘ashamed’.

She said: ‘It’s grossly unfair that at the pinnacle of her sporting career, Italian boxer Angela Carini had to concede for her own safety.

‘The look of sheer pain and devastation in her face at that moment should be enough to end the absurd and dangerous spectacle of men in women’s sport once and for all.

‘People are rightly outraged, and the IOC should be ashamed, but they seem to be shameless as this is their policy in action.

‘Male advantage used against women makes nearly every sport unfair, and some sports unsafe, including boxing. This is still being played out in many sports worldwide.’

Former Prime Minister Liz Truss also waded into the row, writing on Twitter: ‘When will this madness stop? Men cannot become women. Why is the British Government not objecting to this?’ 

British Olympics swimming hero Sharron Davies raged: ‘This is shocking. The IOC are a bloody disgrace. In effect legalising beating up females. This must stop!!! What the hell’s the matter with them?’

While Harry Potter author JK Rowling branded the contest ‘insanity’. In a post yesterday, the gender-critical author wrote: ‘What will it take to end this insanity? A female boxer left with life-altering injuries? A female boxer killed?’

Posting a video of the fight, the author added: ‘Watch this (whole thread), then explain why you’re OK with a man beating a woman in public for your entertainment. This isn’t sport. From the bullying cheat in red all the way up to the organisers who allowed this to happen, this is men revelling in their power over women.’

And speaking to MailOnline, sports scientist Professor Ross Tucker said: ‘Would you allow a 90kg fighter to fight against a 60kg fighter?

‘Because that’s more or less what the difference is in strength and power between male and female boxers.’

Elon Musk, the owner of the social media platform X, endorsed efforts to get a campaign in support of Carini trending.