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INTERNATIONAL matchmaker Sean Gibbons believes that Tokyo Olympics bronze medalist Eumir Felix Marcial could qualify for his second straight Olympics and no doubt take home the gold next year.
Gibbons, also the MP Promotions president, said they allowed the four-time Southeast Asian Games champion to set aside his professional plans for the meantime until after the Hangzhou 20th Asian Games on September 23 to October 8 in China to focus on making it to the Olympics.
“We believe that Eumir Felix Marcial could qualify for the Olympics one more time and take home the gold there,” Gibbons said in giving the go signal to the request of Marcial and the Philippine Olympic Committee (POC) headed by President Abraham Tolentino to pursue another Olympic quest.
He said even the eight-division champion Manny Pacquiao, the founder of the MP Promotions, is also supportive of Marcial’s bid to win an Olympic gold medal, saying the former senator wasn’t hesitant to give way to their decision.
“The MP Promotions, Manny Pacquiao and myself are always for pride and country, and for the development of the fighters. With one more attempt to get there, it doesn’t affect anything in his life where he’s at right now except if we don’t do it,” Gibbons explained.
Marcial, unbeaten in four pro bouts with two knockouts, will be returning to professional fight by the end of the Asian Games sometime in October and then fight by November — whether he qualified for an Olympic berth in Paris or not.
He last fought Ricardo Reuben Villalba of Argentina and scored a second-round technical knockout win last February 11 in San Antonio, Texas.
Gibbons added that they just let Marcial follow his heart to compete for pride and country because that’s what he and Pacquiao wanted too. They do not want Marcial to regret not fighting for the Olympics for the rest of his life.
“It’s real simple it doesn’t conflict with his professional goals this time and I do not want any regrets in Eumir’s life that what could have and what should have been done so we don’t want to leave no stone unturned,” he added.
Pacquiao, Gibbons said, has shouldered a lot of Marcial’s expenses in his pro and amateur training since 2020 in the United States.
“We want to give him his last opportunity to represent the Philippines and his quest for the Olympic gold since he started his amateur boxing,” Gibbons said.
Marcial, who will be campaigning in the heavier men’s 81kg light heavyweight class, will be returning to Manila anytime soon to join the men’s basketball team in the Australia training camp two weeks before heading to Hangzhou, China.
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