The build-up had been so intense and the wait had seemed so long that it was only fitting that the moment David Price became an Olympic medal-winner should be such an anticlimax. Price, the 6ft 9in Liverpudlian, reached the semi-finals in the super-heavyweight division yesterday to be guaranteed a minimum of a bronze medal. With two more boxers aiming to join him on the podium over the next two days, things are looking up again for British boxing.

Price’s bout with Jaroslav Jaksto lasted only two minutes. The Lithuanian was unable to come out for the second round after suffering what appeared to be a dead leg. Afterwards he said that he thought that he had injured a muscle in his back.

Whatever the problem, Price had already proved his dominance in the opening round, working well behind his left jab. One right cross bent Jaksto over the top rope and, as he limped back to his corner at the end of the session 3-1 behind, leg injury or not, he did not look a man keen to continue.

“It’s a great feeling to be guaranteed a medal,” Price said. “It was a bit of an anticlimax the way it happened, but I’m not complaining. I’ll take the win. I think I sickened him a couple of times, and I knew I was going to get him anyway. It’s a great win because he has been a thorn in my side since he beat me in Germany five years ago. That defeat hurt me, but in the long run I was better because of it.”

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Price, 25, next faces Roberto Cammarelle, the world amateur champion from Italy, with whom he has history, too. It was Cammarelle’s victory over Price in the quarter-finals of the European Championships in Pula, Croatia, in 2004, that prevented Price from going to the Athens Olympics that year. Price, who had to pull out of a rematch with Cammarelle at last year’s World Championships in Chicago after breaking his hand, believes that he is a different boxer now.

“Then I just went into it hoping for the best and hoping for a good experience,” Price said. “Now I go in believing I can win the fight. I can’t look at it as revenge, because I’m just going to think about it as an Olympic semi-final and anything can happen. I can definitely beat him on my night and this is the best place to do it. I’ve beaten one of the favourites, now I’ve got another.”

There has been a lot of talk of pressure this week, but Price looked like a relaxed boxer against Jaksto and he hopes that will rub off on Tony Jeffries, the light-heavyweight, and James DeGale, the middleweight, who aim to follow Price into the last four in the next 48 hours.

Price’s victory seemed to lift the cloud that has hung over the British team since Frankie Gavin, the world amateur lightweight champion, went home without throwing a punch, having failed to make the weight. Since then there has been a fear of underachievement and three boxers were eliminated by opponents they had beaten in the past nine months.

The pressure of competition has played on some. Bradley Saunders spoke of a weight coming off his shoulders when he lost. Jeffries, who faces Imre Szello, of Hungary, today, seemed a bag of nerves in edging through his previous bout. Jeffries beat Szello by a 12-11 points decision in June, but as we have seen here, form is no guarantee of success.

Price’s achievement means that Atlanta in 1996 is the only Games since 1964 at which Britain has failed to win a boxing medal. However, Britain has not won more than one medal at a Games since 1972. “The pressure is completely off me now,” Price said.

His family missed his stoppage victory over Islam Timurziev, the Russian world No 1, last Wednesday and arrived in China yesterday. “I didn’t want them to come and not be able to go out for a bevvy,” he said. “They’ll be having about eight pints now.”