IT was a coronation mired in controversy.
Nicola Adams earned her place in history as anticipated by becoming the first female boxer to win gold at a Commonwealth Games in the 51kg flyweight division.
Her trademark smile on the podium, as wide as the Clyde and as dazzling as the spotlights which shone down on the ring, portrayed the Olympic champion's pride in her achievement. The tears of Northern Ireland's Michaela Walsh in the silver medallist's position beside her told much of the story of their fight in the final.
As the boxers re-entered the arena for the medal ceremony after a quick wash and change, Walsh looked square into a waiting television camera, pointed at her chest and mouthed the words: "I won."
She might have had a point. This was a close contest as the tight split decision testified. Walsh believes, with great justification, that she claimed both the first and fourth rounds. The second most probably went to Adams and you can take your pick over who got the better of the third.
The judge from Kazakhstan, Rakhymzhan Rysbayev, scored the contest 39-37 in favour of the English fighter. The other two, Jones Kennedy Rosario of Brazil and Gerardo Poggi of Argentina, scored it dead level at 38-38.
In such circumstances, though, they must pick a winner. Rosario plumped for Walsh and Poggi went for Adams. "I knew it was level, but I worked for it that little bit more and wanted it that little bit more," said Walsh. "I feel I have been cheated.
"Nicola is a great ambassador for women's sport and I congratulate her, but I hope she stays amateur because I want that rematch in Rio and I will take the gold. In my heart, I have got the gold medal. I have a silver round my neck, but I just want to spray-paint it gold because that should have been mine.
"One of the officials even said to me that whoever won the last round should have won the fight. I felt I won the first, fell asleep a little in the second, could have won the third and definitely won the fourth."
It does seem quite incredible that the judge from Kazakhstan scored the contest three rounds to one in Adams' favour. In an added twist, he gave Walsh the second round, the one which she conceded was lost. "When I fought my Indian opponent in the previous round, the Kazakhstan judge had me losing," said the 21-year-old from Belfast. "He mustn't like me or something."
For Adams, the debate matters little when compared to her success in establishing her place in sporting legend. "This means absolutely everything. I'm so happy," said the 31-year-old. "This is second only to the Olympics. It's way up there, making history. I thought I did enough."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article