It wasn’t pretty but it was momentous as James DeGale won the Olympic middleweight boxing gold medal in Beijing yesterday. It was Britain’s 19th gold of the Games. It may also have saved the job of Britain’s boxing coach, saved funding for the boxing programme for 2012 and transformed the finances and status of DeGale.

At the end, when Emilio Correa of Cuba had been vanquished by 16 points to 14, whistles and boos rang around the Worker’s Gymnasium. They could also be heard during the playing of the national anthem. If those boos were a commentary on the quality of the boxing, that was fair enough. If they were intended to express displeasure at the result, they were unfair. “That was disrespect,” said DeGale, who is from Harlesden, London, and he was right for he contributed what little boxing of class there was, and his first-round performance alone, which gave him a substantial lead, earned him the gold.

“I’ve made history,” DeGale said and so he had. He follows such luminaries as Chris Finnegan who won the middleweight gold in 1968, Harry Mallin, perhaps Britain’s greatest ever amateur boxer, who won the same medal twice in the 1920s, and Johnny Douglas, who won it in 1908 and also captained England at cricket.

We cannot entirely draw a veil over the fight. For the most part, it had the choreography and aesthetics of a bar-room brawl. There was just as much holding, pushing, wrestling and fouling as boxing. We saw the return of the cross-buttock, a means of throwing the opponent to the floor which went out of fashion at the end of the Regency. We even had a bite, Correa on DeGale during the first round, for which the Cuban was deducted two points. DeGale confirmed it. “He bit my chest,” he said. “I saw his gold teeth shining through his gumshield. He knows it.” DeGale bared his chest to exhibit the evidence: a small abrasion, no blood.

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Correa had an inventive explanation. “He came into me and I had my mouth open,” he said. In his four previous contests in Beijing, DeGale had used a strategy jabbing quickly with either hand and getting out of the way. He used it to good effect in the first round, taking the first three points with sharp punches. The penalty against Correa for biting extended DeGale’s lead to 6-1 at the end of the round, which in most contests is conclusive.

“Nobody can beat me in terms of skill,” said DeGale, who is not short of self-appreciation, and it was true that the Cuban, whose father won an Olympic gold in boxing, changed tactics because he had to. He began to launch heavy and wild attacks, getting closer to DeGale. Chants of “Cuba, Cuba” rang out as the fight descended into the rough-house.

The Korean referee, Kim Bong, did not distinguish himself for both boxers deserved lectures and penalties as they mauled and wrestled each other to the canvas. But in truth it was a brawl that was all but impossible to referee. Correa’s best chance came and went in the third round. DeGale was docked two points for holding — he claimed he was the innocent party but it was six of one, half a dozen of the other — and Correa followed up with a clean right hand that shook DeGale to his boots. He took it well. “I’ve been hit harder,” DeGale said. “I can take a shot.”

The fourth and final round was no more scientific, but it had an extra urgency and the tantalising matter of whether DeGale could hang on as Correa desperately tried to make up a two-point deficit. He did hang on, and at the end there was as much joy for the British coach, Terry Edwards, who jumped up and down in his delight, as there was for DeGale.

For the gold medal is as much a vindication of Edwards, who has been the target of political in-fighting within British amateur boxing, as a life-changing victory for DeGale. “All that bulls*** Terry’s been getting, we didn’t need that,” DeGale said.

It seems almost unbelievable, but while Edwards and his team have managed to win one gold and two bronze medals — the best haul for a British Olympic team since 1956 — attempts have been made to undermine his position as coach and performance director.

While many British sporting bodies are basking in the smiles of a golden Olympics, and taking credit for impeccable organisation and unity between athletes and administrators, British amateur boxing has revealed itself as a writhing nest of vipers. The poison was first infused by an announcement in London that Billy Joe Saunders, the welterweight who had been beaten in his first bout and had flown home, had been suspended by the Amateur Boxing Association. That was accompanied by a leak to a tabloid newspaper which detailed the allegation against Saunders, claiming the Englishman posted a film showing him confronting a French woman in a sexually explicit and abusive manner while staying in a hotel with the British team. The article added several other allegations of misbehaviour to paint a picture of a team that was wildly out of control.

Edwards, a former printer and cab-driver, has been associated with the British amateur boxing team for more than 25 years. His pride in his boxers and his affection for them is unmistakeable, and is reciprocated, as DeGale made clear. He had two fighters to manage at the Sydney Olympics and one, Amir Khan, in Athens. Bringing eight through to qualification in Beijing was an achievement but brought the problems of managing a group.

It doesn’t take much imagination to realise that a group of young men, mostly from deprived backgrounds, with good money to spend might misbehave when they get together. The seriousness of that misbehaviour has yet to be properly detailed, but it appears to have been exaggerated to suit a political purpose.

Set against the allegations is Edwards’s excellent record. He has taken boxers to finals in three successive Olympics, also winning gold with Audley Harrison in Sydney and silver with Khan in Athens. It has been achieved by his efforts, his plan and the funding support he has procured. By getting that funding from UK Sport and being given the backing of Sir Clive Woodward’s Professional Management Group, a kind of Olympic trouble-shooting organisation, Edwards has established a powerful position independent of the ABA, which has excited jealousy. Those who support Edwards, including the British Olympic Association, are furious about the timing of the the leak.

The boxers and those who control the Olympic purse strings have rallied around Edwards. “If Terry stays, I stay,” said DeGale. “As long as the money’s right I am happy to continue as an amateur until 2012. That goes for many of the team. We’re like brothers.”

DOWN BUT NOT OUT
The Games started terribly for our boxing team when Frankie Gavin failed to make his weight and Bradley Saunders said he was glad to lose. By the end they had had their best Games since 1956

British Lords of the Rings

British boxing’s postwar gold medal winners

Dick McTaggart Dundee’s McTaggart was a five-time ABA (Amateur Boxing Association) champion, winning 610 of 634 bouts.

Having beaten Russia’s Anatoly Lagetko in his semi-final in Melbourne in 1956 at lightweight, he beat Germany’s Harry Kurschat on points in the final. He won bronze at lightweight in 1960 in Rome and was eliminated in the third round in Tokyo 1964

Terry Spinks Spinks, from West Ham, won the ABA flyweight title in 1956 having been an apprentice jockey before he switched to boxing. In the final in Melbourne he encountered Romania’s Mircea Dobrescu, whom he defeated on points. As a pro, he had 49 fights, winning 41.

In 1960 he beat Bobby Niell to win the British featherweight title.

Chris Finnegan The Iver Heath man won the ABA middleweight title in 1966. In his quarter-final bout in Mexico in 1968 he beat Mate Parlov who later won gold for Yugoslavia in 1972. In the middleweight final, Finnegan outpointed Alexei Kisselev of Russia. Finnegan went on to challenge world light heavyweight champion Bob Foster in 1972, losing in the 14th round in a classic.

Audley Harrison Hailing from Wembley, Harrison won the ABA title in 1997-98 and went on to win the Olympic super heavyweight title by beating Kazakhstan’s Mukhtarkhan Dildabekov in the final in Sydney. He turned pro to much fanfare, signing a lucrative contract with the BBC, but suffered defeat on points against Danny Williams in 2005 and was outpointed in his next bout