Despite the decision by Britain’s amateur boxing authorities not to participate in the upcoming World Series of Boxing it is interesting that AIBA, the sport’s international governing body, has chosen London to announce the draft of boxers for their revolutionary tournament on Monday.

This least shows there is no ill feeling that London has elected not to have one of the European city franchises and that consequently no British boxers are involved.

As things have turned out - the downtown in the economy, the closer scrutiny of funding in the light of budget cuts and the need to concentrate on the build-up towards the Commonwealth Games, the new British Championships and the London Olympics in 2012 - Derek Mapp and the British Amateur Boxing Association are right to have exercised prudence.

While any selected boxers might have earned a good few bob for their appearance, the priority has to be focussing on these events, especially as the new head coach Rob McCracken is now getting results from his squad that hold out some hope of England equalling the eight-medal (five gold) haul from the last Commonwealth Games in Melbourne and the three medals (one gold, two bronze) from Beijing.

The decision to hold the event in London is odd, as it is unlikely to attract media attention in the middle if Wimbledon and with England deep in the grip of World Cup-itis. What can IMG, World Series’ high-profile PR backers, be thinking of?

Another interesting aspect of the launch is that one of the World Series stars to be paraded by AIBA is the Italian world amateur lightweight champion Dominica Valentino, who was beaten  by Liverpool’s Tommy Stalker in the recent European Championships in Moscow. This is a measure of the progress under McCracken.

GB’s European performance was the best for 53 years, landing three silver and two bronze. McCracken, who since his appointment earlier this year has turned things around at Britain’s elite boxing HQ at the English Institute of Sport in Sheffield, reckons: "With a bit more luck we’d have come out with more medals - perhaps with a gold. These boys are fantastic, they are showing real potential.

"We have a nice atmosphere in Sheffield, they work hard and they know what I ask them to do is for their own benefit. We have a good team in place although we need to build some more strength in the higher weights, but we are working on that. The boxers and the coaches all deserve a pat on the back."

McCracken singles out Stalker for beating the Valentino. "And Iain Weaver (pictured) was outstanding at featherweight. He is proving himself a top international boxer and will go from strength to strength. There is going to be real competition for places because the way we are strengthening up we will have two really good boxers in most weight divisions. Look at the example of Weaver and the former European champion Luke Campbell at featherweight, two solid international boxers."

The boxers themselves are also full of praise for McCracken: "Since he took over things have changed for the better," says flyweight silver medallist Khalid Yafai. "He’s so professional, so calm and experienced. He’s also turned us into real athletes."

Brummie McCracken, a former world pro middleweight title contender, says it has taken him some time to get used to the judging system in amateur boxing. "It’s all about scoring a single point and you get a lot of boxers simply keeping their gloves up and making to difficult for their opponents to score. And they don’t seem to recognise body punching. That’s very disappointing - especially in Khalid bout because I felt he won comfortably in all three rounds. But you have to work within the system, with what they are looking for and you hope things will change a bit before the Games.

"I think we learned from these Championships that we have strength in depth and real potential with the youngsters. Khalid’s younger brother Gamal was terrific. He’s just turned 18, had four bouts out there and was unlucky against the Russians in the semis. He really stepped up for one so young."

McCracken was brought in after a turbulent, non-productive spell following the departure of long-serving Olympic coach Terry Edwards. The team had failed to win a medal at last year’s World Championships but this year they have fistfuls from a number of high profile tournaments.

McCracken will be taking a full squad of 14 English boxers to the Commonwealth Games in Delhi and says it will be interesting to see how his men shape up against the Asians and Africans, particularly in the lighter weight divisions. "But the good news for us is that in many weight divisions, the European Championships are as tough as it gets. It was good to see how many of our boys were comfortable against the Russians and Germans."

GB will also be testing themselves against a Chinese team here in August and will be boxing against a Rest of the World team in the World Championship of Boxing Festival in Cardiff at the end of next month.  

"We are finalising the team at the moment and this may be a chance for some of the other boxers to show that they can do it as well," says McCracken, who also trains Britain’s former world super-middleweight champion, Carl Froch. They are waiting on a date and venue for his next bout, against Germany’s Arthur Abraham, in the Super Six series and hoping it will not clash with the Commonwealth Games in October.

Other boost for British amateur boxing came last week with the announcement that Lucozade are to become the sport’s official nutrion partners through to 2013 and and that the inaugural British Championships, in which the winners of the home ABA’s will participate, is to be televised by the BBC from the Liverpool Echo Arena on November 12 and 13.

Alan Hubbard is an award-winning sports columnist for The Independent on Sunday, and a former sports editor of The Observer. He has covered 11 summer Olympics and scores of world title fights from Atlanta to Zaire, and is a former chairman of the Boxing Writers’ Club