British boxer Ben Whittaker tucked his silver medal in his pocket and sobbed on the platform on Wednesday, declaring himself a ‘failure’ for losing to Team Cuba’s Arlen Lopez, according to reports.
‘You don’t win silver, you lose gold. I’m very disappointed – I feel like a failure,’ the 24-year-old told reporters after finishing second in the light-heavyweight competition.
‘You’re in this game to win gold. I don’t want to feel like this again. I’m going to put this to the back of my mind. I’ll come back, trust me,’ he added.
While competitors from the Russia Olympic Committee and Azerbaijan grinned with their rewards around their necks, Whittaker hesitantly took the silver medal out of his pocket and held it for photographers while on the podium.
‘Come on Ben enjoy it, you’ll never get this moment back!’ as Whittaker pouted, a coach in the grandstand screamed in the backdrop.
Later, he looked to regret his outburst of dissatisfaction but said he couldn’t stand to celebrate silver.
‘I don’t want to look like a baby or a spoiled brat but I am so upset that I didn’t win the gold. I feel like I lost gold. I can’t celebrate silver… I was doing it for everybody at home and I felt like a failure,’ he told the outlet.
‘At the time, I should have put this beautiful silver medal around my neck and smiled because this is not just for me, it’s for the country. When I look back in a few years, it will probably feel like a great achievement, but I was so upset that I couldn’t enjoy it,’ Whittaker said.
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He complimented Lopez on a well-deserved victory, conceding that he ‘didn’t have the appropriate game plan’ and that his opponent ‘was a lot better than I thought.’
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