Gemma Richardson: “2024 has been the worst year of my life. My dream got stolen. They stole my dream.”

Gemma Richardson: “2024 has been the worst year of my life. My dream got stolen. They stole my dream.”

A decorated amateur career ended in controversy and bitterness. An amateur resume that included being a European and World Champion at Youth level. There was also a silver medal at the 2022 Commonwealth Games, plus five National titles. Only seven defeats in sixty-seven fights show the quality and potential of a fighter who started the year with very big dreams indeed.

Gemma Richardson was seemingly headed to the Paris Olympics. A battle with fellow Team GB stalwart Shona Whitwell was well underway. Both had merits in that race for selection for Paris.

But the Amy Broadhurst saga was about to unfold. It was a bitter episode that shouldn’t have happened for many reasons. It left Richardson and Whitwell out in the cold. They were two victims of a decision that was seemingly made without empathy or consideration for the bigger picture. The desperate search for medals overrode loyalty and more.

Both fighters have now moved on. A new world awaits the two former amateur stars, with Richardson announcing her intentions first. Richardson has signed a professional contract with Steve Wood and VIP Boxing Promotions and will be trained by John Stubbs in the North-East at the Tenacity Gym.

“I can’t wait, and now the process has started. It feels more real now,” Richardson told me over Zoom. “I am now more excited about it. I think at the start I was in two minds about what happened. But it just made sense to turn professional. This was always the plan. If I didn’t go to the Paris Olympics, I was always going to be turning pro this year. But it was just the circumstances. But now it’s getting going, I am getting more excited about it.”

The process is now well underway. Richardson hopes to have her debut in February. A fighter who has found her love for a sport that left her on the brink of walking away not so long ago.

A new journey will begin early in the new year with Steve Wood guiding her career.

“I went for a meeting, and I don’t think Steve Wood is in it for the money,” Richardson says, explaining why she signed with Wood. “He is straight to the point and tells you what’s what. I feel like I have got a good connection with him and that I can trust him, and it will be a good little team around me.”

The controversy over what happened earlier this year still lingers. Broadhurst had exhausted her selection process for Ireland. However, on the strength of a dual passport, she was drafted in by Team GB at the last minute, with only one Olympic qualifier left in the race to Paris.

Broadhurst was subsequently picked for that one remaining qualifier but ultimately failed to make the grade for Paris. A feeling that it was all for nothing on all sides.

“Sometimes, when I look back on it, it still hurts,” Richardson says of that painful moment in her career. “To me, I describe it as like a break-up. I wasn’t angry at first, I was just heartbroken. But then I went through stages of anger towards it, flipping between being angry and sad. But I had to let it go. Nothing was going to change. I did go back to Sheffield for a bit. Obviously, Shona left straightaway. So I was the first reserve, so I still had a chance. In the back of my head, I was giving it 100% just in case something happened to Amy. I went to Thailand, which was the training camp for the team, including the reserves. I came back, and I was still there, but it just wasn’t right for me. The love and trust had gone at that point for me. I wasn’t really engaging and speaking to most of the coaches. The atmosphere didn’t feel right, and my heart wasn’t in it anymore. And then I had the break for the summer, and I had three weeks away, and those three weeks were what cemented me to leave. I was a lot happier with the training and with the sport again.”

Even all these months on, the pain of that extremely low period of her life is still there. Six years of dedication that ended on such a sour note.

“I got on Team GB when I was seventeen,” Richardson relayed to me. “I won the World Championships. I was on the cycle for Tokyo, even though that wasn’t my cycle. I never wanted Tokyo, but it was good for my development. Then I did my cycle, and I was literally a couple of weeks away when it all happened. Obviously, that American tournament was the deciding tournament. I was picked as the reserve, so if Amy didn’t come, I was going to that qualifier. For it all to be ripped away from me when it was so close after all those years of doing everything I needed to do. I went to that American tournament, and I was told whoever got the furthest in that tournament would be going, and that was me, I got to the final.

“As much as I knew when Amy came that I wasn’t going, but you still have that little hope. But I was told I would be the first reserve, and straight away, I got told do you want to be the reserve because things do happen. In my head, I can’t go down without a fight, even though the reserve hardly ever gets picked. But if Amy did injure herself, and I didn’t go to that Thailand training camp, then I would be more annoyed with myself. I would have regrets for the rest of my life. So I knew I just had to give it a go.

“But I struggled mentally in Thailand. All the girls were helping me. I have great friends there and they were really helping me. I had a few weeks off, and everyone was telling me what to do. I was confused. My head was gone. But when I had those few weeks off, I said what do I want to do. But at that point, I just thought that my four years there were wasted. I didn’t think I could go back after what they did to me. I felt a bit embarrassed as well. When I went back, I didn’t post anything on social media because I didn’t want anyone to know that I had gone back. I didn’t want people to think I was an idiot and that I was embarrassing myself. So straight away I’m thinking that’s not right, I shouldn’t be hiding the fact that I am here. But at the end of the day, I just thought, what if that happens again and I give another four years of my life for nothing? I just knew I couldn’t do it anymore, and I needed a team that I could trust.”

It was the system that failed Gemma Richardson. It shouldn’t have been an option for Amy Broadhurst to switch allegiances so late in the day. Richardson doesn’t have any real issues with Broadhurst, but she most certainly does with how the situation was handled.

“I am not even angry at Amy. It’s a selfish sport, and she took that chance and fair play to her. I am more upset how they all went about it. I wish I had been warned. I should not have found out on Facebook when I was on camp. I found out on Facebook, and people were messaging me, and that was embarrassing for me. Someone from Team GB should have contacted me and said this is what was happening. To bring somebody in from another country was the wrong way to go about it. We found out on Facebook on the Thursday, and on Monday, Amy was on camp. So it was all done wrong, and that is what upsets me the most. I should trust my coaches, and in that split second, I just thought, “Oh my god, it’s all been done behind my back.”

“But I am not going to sit here and slate Team GB. I have been there for a number of years, and I loved it for the first few years. It was only in the last year when everything happened. I did try to push it aside. But I couldn’t in the end. It was just too big for me to get past. 2024 has been the worst year of my life. My dream got stolen. They stole my dream. To have that dream and then how it all went. I didn’t know what I was going to do, whether I was staying on GB or going pro, I didn’t know if I was going to quit the sport. I just thought I have had enough of this sport now. Did I want to even bother any more? It was mentally tough. I didn’t want to train at one point. I went months without training. I lost all my motivation. But now, the dream changes. The goal changes. If you stay on one thing, then you are never going to progress. I have been in the gym since I was six, and I have always had goals and dreams. If I were that six-year-old girl now to just give up, I would be devastated as that kid. I have sacrificed so much and missed out on things in my childhood. I can’t just sack it off because I have had one shit year.”

But Richardson is finally moving on after that long period of reflection and soul-searching. At 23, she has plenty of time to forge a long and successful career in the professional ranks. With an aim just to stay busy and develop at a rapid pace.

“I am going to start at super-featherweight because that is what I roughly boxed at in the amateurs. I will then mix about at other weights if I need to go down or up. There are a few weights we are looking at covering.

“In the first year, I want to get in as many fights as I possibly can. I want to be active, and I want to be pushed. It’s a completely different sport than the amateurs. I have got a lot of experience as an amateur, and I want to do that again. I want as many fights as I can get in that first year and get the experience and push on as fast as I can.”             

Gemma Richardson will be making a new beginning in the coming months. If anyone deserves a new start, it’s her.