Olympics 2020 boxing results: Great Britain’s Galal Yafai takes flyweight gold over Carlo Paalam of the Philippines

Great Britain’s Galal Yafai is now an Olympic gold medalist, taking the men’s flyweight final bout over the Philippines’ Carlo Paalam.

The win also gives Great Britain its first boxing gold medal at Tokyo 2020, and denies the Philippines once again as the country will continue to wait on its first boxing gold medal in the Olympics. The Filipino team overall showed great talent in Tokyo, though, with two silver medals and a bronze.

Yafai started aggressively, dropping Paalam on a straight left hand out of the southpaw stance in round one, but Paalam was overall competitive enough in the round to keep it 10-9 across the board, giving himself some hope going into the second round.

The second was more competitive, but Yafai took it on four of five judges’ cards, giving him a lead to protect in round three. And the usually intense and pressure-heavy Yafai mostly did protect that lead, with Paalam sweeping the round but coming up short on four cards, all of which were 29-28 in Yafai’s favor. The fifth card saw it for Paalam, 29-28.