Ella Thompson part of 3 Arena boxing bill
BOXING
Young Meath boxer Ella Thompson is one of the fighters taking part in a schedule of bouts at the 3 Arena next Friday evening.
Thompson (16) who is from Summerhill takes on Dolly Sambrook from the UK in an amateur bout.
The 3 Arena show features the highly anticipated homecoming to Ireland of Cork native Callum Walsh who will defend his WBC Continental Americas Super Welterweight title in the main event against Polish fighter Przemyslaw Runowski. The co-main event will see Ali Akhmedov and Pierre Hubert Dibombe compete in a 10-round Super Middleweight bout.
Teenager Thompson, who attends Scoil Dara in Kilcock, continues to make an impact in the world of boxing - something that's hardly surprising because she has shown tremendous dedication to getting better in her chosen sport.
That dedication is paying off too. She was crowned Junior 2 All-Ireland champion in the 46kg category at Roscommon last April - another title in a string of triumphs she has claimed in her young career so far.
A big admirer of Katie Taylor (she trained with the World champion a few years ago) Thompson has, in recent times, won a Leinster title. She was also victorious in the Michael Andrews championships, the Manchester Winter Box Cup and the Riga Box Cup. In addition to all that she reached the finals of the Sweden Golden Girls, Wexford Box Cup and the Belfast Box Cup in her category - all in recent times.
Those competitions were just some of the steps taken by the youngster in fulfilling an ambition she has harboured and worked on from an early age - to represent Ireland in boxing in the Olympics. Sports people are constantly encouraged to have goals. Ella has hers - and they are written up in lights for all to see.
"Ella loves boxing and lives for the sport," is how her father and trainer Cliff Thompson put it," her father Cliff Thompson told the Meath Chronicle earlier this year. "Ella's dream and her goal is to represent Ireland in the Olympics, and if she doesn't get that she wants to be a professional but I wouldn't like her to follow that route until she has finished college first."