Paris: Samoa’s Ato Plodzicki-Faoagali broke down in tears Sunday, describing his anguish after his coach died of a heart attack at the Olympic Village two days before the boxer’s opening bout.
The 25-year-old lost on points to Belgian fighter Victor Schelstraete, but the Samoan said that just dragging himself into the Paris ring felt like a victory after a tragic 48 hours.
“I don’t care about the medal right now. My deepest feeling right now is for coach Lionel,” he said.
“He would tell me to keep my head high. Not only to fight hard in the fight, but also just to give it my all. I gave it my all,” he added, asked what coach Lionel Elika Fatupaito would have said to him.
Fatupaito was found dead at the Olympic Village on Friday. Emergency medics battled in vain to revive the 60-year-old but pronounced him dead “of natural causes”.
Plodzicki-Faoagali said he had agonised over whether to pull out since the tragedy and admitted his mind was not fully on boxing.
“I’m trying to stay strong. It’s been hard. I’ve been struggling mentally the past few days,” he said, tears flowing down his cheeks.
“I thought I was going to win a medal for sure, but it’s been really hard mentally on me. I’ve been trying to hold it together,” he sobbed.
The fighter received a huge cheer when he entered the arena in the 92kg bout.
At the end of the fight, scored unanimously in favour of Schelstraete, the pair shared a lengthy embrace, the Belgian whispering into his opponent’s ear and then thrusting his hand into the air to raucous cheers.
“I told him, you’re a winner, you deserve nothing but respect for honouring your coach and sticking through,” Schelstraete told AFP.
“I asked myself the question: Would I be able to box if my coach had died? And I genuinely don’t think so, so big respect to him. He’s got a big heart,” the Belgian added.
Schelstraete said he had to put his feelings aside for the bout but the emotion came flooding out of both of them when the final bell sounded.
“I felt genuinely sorry for him so I was happy I could share my emotions at the end, real emotions.”
The unfortunate Plodzicki-Faoagali also required lengthy medical treatment afterwards for a cut to his eye.
‘Chase my dreams’
Plodzicki-Faoagali, his country’s only boxer at the Paris Games, first donned boxing gloves aged five, and met his coach at 15 when trialling for the youth team.
The Pacific Island has only won one medal at a Summer Games, Ele Opeloge taking weightlifting silver at Beijing 2008.
But the country boasts a proud boxing history. David Tua, who fought professionally from 1992 to 2013, was one of the world’s top heavyweights at the peak of his career.
Nicknamed the “Tuamanator”, he drew comparisons to Mike Tyson for his hard-punching, fast-moving style.
Tua, who held joint Samoan-New Zealand nationality, fought many of the best boxers of his era and challenged for the unified world heavyweight title against Lennox Lewis in 2000.
Samoan boxer James Peau, or Jimmy Thunder as he was known in the ring, holds the distinction of the fastest-ever knock-out.
Thunder knocked out American Crawford Grimsley with his first punch in 1997. The fight lasted 1.5 seconds.
Plodzicki-Faoagali vowed to bounce back after the tragic events of the last few days.
“I have a heavy heart right now ... but I’m going to come back stronger and chase my dreams,” he said.
