JOE Cordina’s dream of landing Olympic gold is over after he was beaten in Rio this afternoon.

The St Joseph’s ace lost via a split decision to Uzbekistan’s Hurshid Tojibaev in the last 16 of the 60kg lightweight division.

Cordina, who had beaten Charly Suarez of the Philippines in his opening bout, went down 28-28, 29-27, 29-27 to the number five seed.

The Welshman was caught with a left hand in the first few seconds of the contest, but he grew in confidence as the round wore on.

However, the left of Tojibaev continued to cause Cordina problems and the former ended up taking the round.

Tojibaev made another bright start when the second round got under way.

Cordina replied with a nice right upper cut, although he then got caught on the ropes and Tojibaev took advantage.

But Cordina was thrown a lifeline soon after when, having already been warned once for a low blow, Tojibaev repeated the indiscretion and was deducted a point by the referee.

All three judges gave the round to Tojibaev but the point away meant it was shared.

Cordina needed a big final round to sway the judges in his favour, but Tojibaev’s punching power was there for all to see.

A succession of blows to the body and then a long left put Cordina on the back foot again, and the Cardiff-born boxer was unable to really give anything back in response.