Int’l footballer clinches CWG boxing medal

GOLD COAST: It is a choice that many sports fans would love to have: play football for your country at a World Cup or be a boxer at the Olympics.

That was the dilemma facing Lauren Price, and her decision to plump for boxing paid off on Friday when she won her semi-final at the Commonwealth Games to secure at least silver for Wales. The multi-talented 23-year-old can make it gold and a Commonwealth title if she beats Australia’s Caitlin Parker at the Gold Coast in their middleweight clash on Saturday.

Price, who was also a kick-boxing champion, has no regrets about ditching her football career as a tenacious defender with Cardiff City and the Welsh national side. “I had 52 caps for Wales and I played my last game against England — we lost — and I stopped when I got selected (for boxing) for the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow (2014),” Price told AFP. “Obviously I couldn’t do both at a high level.” Price went on to win bronze at the Glasgow Commonwealths and then joined the GB Boxing programme, where fighters receive intensive, full-time training for the Olympics, her ultimate aim. The football — in which she had also been captain of the under-19 Welsh women’s side — had to go.

“It got to the point where I had to pick one,” Price said, after earning a unanimous points decision over the awkward Tammara Thibeault of Canada to set up Saturday’s gold-medal showdown.She has the talent but not the inclination to return to football any time soon, if ever.