Welsh boxing twins Ioan and Garan Croft say they left the Great Britain podium squad five months before the 2024 Paris Olympics after losing “trust” in GB Boxing.
The issue came to a head when neither 22-year-old was chosen for the Olympic qualifiers in Italy from 4-11 March.
“There were a few decisions that left us pretty unhappy, not fully on the selection but the way it was handled and the way we were told,” said Garan.
“Our trust had gone.”
He added: “We decided to move on. We did have a long, hard think about it and decided for us it would probably be the best thing.”
Ioan said: “To this day we still haven’t been given a reason on why we weren’t selected.”
The twins’ path to Paris had become unclear in recent months.
A change to the Olympic weight classes meant they would both have to compete in the 71kg category, meaning only one of them would get to go.
In order to qualify, one brother would have needed to beat the other and the twins have spoken in the past about never wanting to fight each other.
Lewis Richardson was picked to go to Italy instead and the twins say a meeting with GB Boxing chiefs left them believing their omissions had not been explained.
Garan said: “We had a meeting with them and we sat there for nearly two hours. The representatives from Welsh Boxing as well, who have been great supporting us at difficult times [were there].
“We left that meeting room two hours later and we still hadn’t been given a reason.”
Ioan added: “We left feeling more confused than when we went in.”