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THE International Boxing Organisation has confirmed at least one Anthony Mundine supporter bullied a judge during Wednesday night's middleweight world-title bout against Daniel Geale.
British judge Marcus McConnell was approached ringside by a male and verbally abused after awarding a round to Geale during the middle stages of the fight.

McConnell eventually awarded the bout to Mundine - 114-113.

IBO supervisor Phil Austin last night confirmed the incident, which McConnell reported two hours after the final bell.

"Marcus said there was a young guy who came up and looked over his shoulder as he was scoring the round," Austin said.

"When he gave Geale the round, this kid yelled: 'What the f . . . did you do that for?'

"Marcus has 23 years experience as a boxing judge and won't be intimidated so easily. He replied. 'You just f . . . off out of here and f . . . off now'."

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Austin said the incident occurred between the sixth and eighth round, with McConnell seated on the immediate right-hand side of Mundine's corner.

"Had there been an immediate complaint I would have had the person ejected and the promoter alerted," Austin said. "Had I felt the judge was in any was influenced, I would have declared a no-result.

"But I have complete faith in Marcus. He's a star-class judge in the UK and has copped much worse than that at hostile places around the world like Africa."

McConnell was on his way to London last night and was unavailable for comment.

"Marcus told me as I was taking him to Brisbane airport straight after the fight about 12.30am (yesterday)," Austin said.

"His plane left at 2.45am, so he was straight out of here. He was not disturbed or shaken up. He thought the bloke was kidding himself."

But onlookers last night claimed the harassment from Mundine's people was even worse.

Some of the larger members of his 15-strong entourage allegedly took their place either side of McConnell during the fight. They shamelessly looked at the scorecards as McConnell handed them to officials at the end of each round.

Another person could clearly be heard swearing at McConnell from Mundine's corner after receiving score updates from his offsiders, even hinting at a conspiracy when a round didn't go their way.

"They've got a plan, it's all part of their plan," he said.

Panic set in at Mundine's corner as scores came through towards the end of the 12-round fight - and then it really got ugly. One member of his entourage stood over McConnell and hurled abuse at the judge when he saw he awarded Geale the 10th round, allegedly calling him "racist".

Austin said it was not uncommon for onlookers to get up close and personal with a judge.

"The scorecards are quite big, so it's not that hard to make out the numbers," Austin said.

Austin added there would be no action taken because McConnell had not lodged a complaint at the time.

Rod Farva

May 29 2009, 07:10 AM

Of course it will be a conspiracy.....

Phat

May 29 2009, 02:35 PM

Mate, I'm not saying its great sportsmanship or anything, but I don't really see how it is different from Brad Fittler saying that his team gets the raw end every week, or a coach requesting that certain referees don't officiate matches involving their team. And above all, do you really think Mundine himself would tell his people to do that? If he indeed does have people in his camp doing that sort of thing he needs to get rid of them but I can't see him actually instructing them to do what that report alleges.

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Even avid anti-Mundine mates of mine said they had no beef with him winning the fight after watching it - I didn't watch the whole thing so I can't say yay or nay on that.

Phat

May 30 2009, 12:19 AM

The "we don't have the judges this time" would more than likely just have meant "we aren't winning this time" but yes, I see your point, and yes, I do think it is disgraceful. I just think though that when things happen during a Mundine fight, HE always gets pinged with it, and HE is made out to be this big bad beacon of all things disgraceful, when in reality they are often problems that we see week in week out in other sports anyway.

I still find it ridiculously hard to believe that Mundine himself would have said to his men "if it's not going my way, go down there and stick it to him". BUt whoever did take it upon themselves to do such a thing, certainly they need to be speared.