Oliver Brown in the Telegraph:
After finding herself easily dismantled in all three rounds, Sitora Turdibekova did not linger for the post-fight handshake. Instead she swept out of the ring in tears, distraught at being so conspicuously outclassed by her opponent in reach, speed and power. If it felt as though we had been here before, we had. Barely 24 hours earlier, in fact. For the Uzbek’s conqueror was Lin Yu-ting of Taiwan, a boxer who, just like Algeria’s Imane Khelif, had recorded two sex tests in two years revealing the presence of XY chromosomes.
While the fight was not as visceral a spectacle as Khelif’s 46-second destruction of Italy’s Angela Carini, the outcome was the same: a beaten woman weeping, a viewing public in uproar, and an Olympics engulfed by rancour and recrimination. This is a scandal assuming dimensions that the International Olympic Committee can no longer control, with each crushing victory by a biologically male fighter over a female confirming the impression that it has abandoned its fundamental duty of care.
Lin was the unanimous winner on points, with Turdibekova holding her head in anguish as the result was announced. Frankly, it had not been much of a contest, with Lin, the top seed in the women’s featherweight division, maximising the reach advantage to rain down shuddering blows and winning every round by every judge except one. Turdibekova’s distress was the worst possible look for the IOC, the day after a sobbing Carini had claimed she feared for her life during the mismatch with Khelif. Both these women needed the global governing body to act decisively to ensure their safety. And both have been abysmally let down.
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