Ireland’s boxers occupy five positions in the top ten in the AIBA World rankings just pubished…

John Joe Nevin, Katie Taylor, Paddy Barnes and Michael Conlan

The updated World Men’s and Women’s rankings were today published by AIBA.

Katie Taylor (1), John Joe Nevin (3) and Michael Conlan (3) are the highest ranked Irish boxers, while Paddy Barnes (7) and Ray Moylette (8) are in the top ten.

London 2012 Olympian Darren O’Neill and Joe Ward are in 11th position in the middleweight and light-heavyweight divisions.

Moylette and Ward are the current European light-welterweight and light-heavyweight champions.

AIBA rankings are based on performances at the AIBA World Men’s and Women’s Championships, Olympic Games, Confederation Championships and AIBA World Youth Championships over a two-year rolling period.

Taylor, who has been ranked number (1) for the last six years, picked up 2,500 ranking points this year by virtue of winning gold medals at the Olympic Games and AIBA World Women’s Championships.

Barnes and Conlan were awarded an extra 50 points each in the light -flyweight and flyweight classes at the London 2012 Games as they officially finished third in their weight classes as they were beaten by the eventual Olympic gold medallists.

The next AIBA ranking tournament will be the 2012 AIBA World Youth Championships which are scheduled to begin in Yerevan, Armenia on November 25th.

Visit http://www.aiba.org/ for full rankings.

Ranking Events, Ranking points to earn for reaching the following place

1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th,

World Championships – 1200, 800, 700, 650, 500, 450, 400, 350, 100, 90.

Olympic Games – 1300, 900, 800, 750, 600, 550, 500, 450, 100, 0.

Confederation Championships – 800, 600, 500, 450, 300, 250, 200, 150, 0, 0,

Youth World Championships – 800, 600, 500, 450, 300, 250, 200, 150, 0, 0,