Britain's head coach Terry Edwards hit out at the judges after bantamweight Joe Murray, the world bronze medallist, became the first British boxer to exit the Olympics after a 17-7 defeat against China's Yu Gu (pictured) at the Workers' Gymnasium.

 

Edwards said: "The judges took it away from him."

 

"I thought they were very generous to the Chinese.

 

"You expect a slight bias but you come to the Olympic Games and expect a level playing field.

 

"Joe didn't box the best I've seen him but the scoring makes a difference and the tactics had to be changed because of the scoring.

 

"Everything the Chinese guy touched, they pressed the button for him."

 

The Ukrainian team also filed an unsuccessful protest over lightweight Oleksandr Klyuchko's 10-8 loss to China's Hu Qing.

 

Klyuchko said: "I thought the Chinese opponent was not very good.

 

"I'm very sad.

 

"I thought I would be the winner."

 

Complaints have not been confined to those defeated by the Chinese, either.

 

The United States coach Dan Campbell did not like the scoring in medal favorite Rau'shee Warren's surprise defet to South Korea's Lee Ok-sung, bemoaning several instances of simultaneous points awarded to both fighters.

 

Campbell said: "Some things you just don't ever want to say, so I won't, but it was just weird the way the scoring was.

 

"It's very stunning, and the thing we're going to try to keep letting our guys know is you've got to try to keep it out of the hands of the judges.

 

"That's a hard thing to do."

 

Computer scoring was introduced in boxing at the Olympics in 1992, four years after American Roy Jones Jr. lost the championship bout in Seoul to South Korean light middleweight Park Si-hun, a decision still considered one of the great travesties in Olympic history.

 

Park even apologised to Jones, and one judge eventually acknowledged his decision was a mistake.

 

Earlier in those Seoul Games, bantamweight Byun Jong-il sat on the canvas at the darkened gym for 67 minutes to protest his loss to Bulgaria's Alexander Hristov.

 

Korean boxing officials, fans and a guard also attacked referee Keith Walker, who had deducted points from Byun for head-butting.

 

But the doubts about judging have not been confined to just the boxing ring.

 

Australia's Russell Mark voiced concerns over the judging at today's double trap shooting, saying it was fortunate a particularly controversial call did not decide the gold medal.

 

 

 

The 1996 gold medallist and five-time Olympian also suggested the sport should look at introducing a video referee for the 2012 London Olympics.

 

The controversy centred on a decision during the medal round, which went the way of Chinese bronze medallist Hu Binyuan.

 

Hu was credited with hitting a target many thought he had missed.

 

Mark said: "Everybody stopped ... I'm glad that wasn't for a gold medal, because that's what these Games would have been remembered for, unfortunately."

 

Mark finished fifth in the event, one ahead of Britain's Sydney 2000 champion Richard Faulds, and was not affected by the decision.

 

He expressed his concern nevertheless.

 

Mark said: "There's clearly some calls there, not for me, for some of the competitors there, that I would be a bit worried about - I'd like to look at the videotape.

 

"I would have called the video ref in if we could have.

 

"Maybe that's something we can introduce for London."