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Irish Olympic champion Michael Carruth is backing the boys in green to claim medals at the AIBA World Junior Championships Yerevan 2009 which starts in Armenia on Saturday.
A six strong Irish squad finished up a five-day training camp in Armenia on Friday ahead of the Championships and Carruth, who beat Cuban Juan Hernandez to win gold for Ireland at the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona, will be keeping a close eye on the performance of 66kg Mike Reilly.
The Dublin born teenager claimed an Irish title at the National Stadium in Dublin recently with Carruth and Tony Davitt working his corner. And he followed that up with a gold medal win at a top Multi Nations tournament in Baku Azerbaijan earlier this month.
Joe Ward, who is captaining the Irish side in Armenia, also bagged gold in Baku to help Ireland finish third behind Russia and the hosts in the medals table.
Carruth also reckons that Ireland's senior stars can't afford to take anything for granted and that the young guns will be pushing for places at the 2012 Olympics.
"Michael's gold medal win in Baku has given him an enormous boost in confidence, you can see that in his sparring and training down at the club," Carruth said. "He will fancy his chances in Armenia, along with young Joe Ward and Chris Mulally and the rest of the Irish squad.
"But it will be very tough in Yerevan. The tournament has broken the record for entries and the Russians, Cubans and eastern European countries will be the ones to beat.
"Ireland's underage squads are doing the business in international competition, not only are the winning medals but they are also winning their weight categories.
"The talent is coming through and the seniors can't afford to be complacent because these youngsters want a piece of the action and their target will be the 2012 Olympics in London."
Irish squad:
52Kg: Roy O'Carroll
54Kg: Ryan McKeown
57Kg: Christy Joyce
64Kg: Chris Mulally
66Kg: Michael Reilly
70Kg: Joe Ward
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