“ANOTHER feather in the cap” of St Paul’s ABC is how club coach Ralph McKay described it as Dylan Eagleson returned to Dublin Airport on Tuesday evening with a silver medal from the European Elite Championships in Armenia.

The 19-year-old bantamweight, boxing in his first major senior international tournament, took another remarkable step forward in his career after claiming bronze at the European U22s earlier this year.

Eagleson may have lost out to experienced Frenchman, Bilal Bennama, in Monday’s final, but even in defeat displayed the style and agility that saw him through to the decider and while he was forced to withstand a second round standing count, battled bravely until the final bell.

“He didn’t get the gold, but it was his first international at that level,” said McKay.
“Going through the U18s and U22s, with the lockdown he didn’t get the chance to box at senior intermediate level.

“He wasn’t even the right age to enter the Ulster or Irish Elites last year but January 1, 2022 came and he was ready to go.

“We all went down to the airport last night (Tuesday) to meet him coming home. It’s another feather in the cap for the club as to how well we’ve come on.”

Eagleson has marked himself out as one of Irish boxing’s new stars after a hugely successful few weeks with Gabriel Dossen taking middleweight gold in Armenia and the women claiming two golds at the recent World Championships.

The St Paul’s man will hope to follow in the footsteps of Brendan Irvine who was the first from the club to box at the Olympics and indeed, joined a unique club as a double Olympian when qualifying for Tokyo.

This summer’s Commonwealth Games in Birmingham is next where another huge performance would see his profile grow further ahead of what he will hope to be a huge couple of years on the rod to Paris 2024.

“Zaur Antia, the Irish High Performance coach, is delighted he’s got him to work with,” McKay added.

“Dylan is a Bangor kid who didn’t win much in terms of Irish titles before he came up to us, but thankfully we’ve been able to help him grow and has been picked for the Commonwealths.

“He will be busy over the next months and years looking ahead to Paris in 2024, so he’s a hope for that.”