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RICHARD TOWERS will now face Frenchman Gregory Tony for the vacant EU heavyweight title at Manchester Velodrome on Saturday June 16.

The 6ft 9in Sheffield giant had been due to meet fellow unbeaten boxer Michael Wallisch on the same bill, but the German has pulled out.

Tony, 33, has 17 wins with 14 coming by knockout  and two defeats – both setbacks coming against top class opponents Robert Helenius and Mike Perez.

Hatton Promotions CEO said: “It is a disappointing that Wallisch is out, but Tony is a decent test.

“The fight will tell us exactly where Richard is at and if he wins he’ll be closing in on the new European champion Kubrat Pulev.

“Richard is making steady progress and inside 12 months will be ready for men like Pulev, Tyson Fury and David Price.”

The ‘Road To Glory’ bill also features a vacant WBA interim super-bantamweight title fight between Scott Quigg and Rendall Munroe. There is also a vacant European light-middleweight title fight between Ryan Rhodes and Sergey Rabchenko.

In a special attraction unbeaten British middleweight champion Martin Murray meets French title holder Karim Achour.

There will be a talent stacked undercard that will include former British and Commonwealth welterweight champion Craig Watson, unbeaten hopefuls Lucas Browne, Kallum De’Ath, Jazza Dickens, Adam Etches, Scott Jenkins and Adam Little.

Ticket prices are now on sale priced £125 (VIP Inner Ringside + exclusive cash bar), £100 Ringside, £55, £35 and £30. You can purchase tickets by calling Hatton Promotions hotline 01925 755 222/www.ticketmaster.co.uk/0844 847 2500/www.ticketline.co.uk/0844 888 4402/www.hmv.com

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HATTON PROMOTIONS mega ‘Road To Glory’ bill is the hottest ticket in boxing

It looks a certainty that the show at Manchester Velodrome on June 16 will be a complete 4300 sell-out

All of the VIP ringside tickets have now been sold, there are very few ringsides left and while other price ranges are available they’re selling fast.

The bumper card is Hatton Promotions biggest so far, and there are even larger events are planned later this year.

Four big fights feature on the bill, including Scott Quigg challenging Rendall Munroe for the vacant interim WBA super-bantamweight crown.

Sheffield’s Ryan Rhodes meets Sergey Rabchenko for the vacant European light-middleweight championship.

Ryan’s fellow steel city fighter Richard Towers squares off against Frenchman Gregory Tony for the vacant EU heavyweight crown.

In a special attraction unbeaten British middleweight champion Martin Murray meets French title holder Karim Achour.

Hatton Promotions CEO Ricky Hatton: “The response from fans all over the country has been fantastic.

“The fighters have all done a great job shifting their allocation and the response from the media on a national and regional level has been great.

“There are still more than two weeks to go and I am confident that on June 16 the ‘House Full’ signs will be hanging at the venue.”

There will be a talent stacked undercard that will include former British and Commonwealth welterweight champion Craig Watson, unbeaten hopefuls Lucas Browne, Kallum De’Ath, Jazza Dickens, Adam Etches, Scott Jenkins and Adam Little.

There are a few £100 Ringside left. Also available are £55, £35 and £30. You can purchase tickets by calling Hatton Promotions hotline 01925 755 222/www.ticketmaster.co.uk/0844 847 2500/www.ticketline.co.uk/0844 888 4402/www.hmv.com

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By Gianluca (Rio) Di Caro

On Saturday night British Light Welterweight Champ Ashley ‘Treasure’ Theophane defended his coveted Lonsdale belt against late replacement Ben Murphy.

Whilst Theophane did manage to retain his title, it was far from a convincing win, and it was the challenger who received all the plaudits, probably because he dominated the fight and all ringside judges had Hove’s Murphy firmly ahead on points at the start of the eleventh.

No surprise then that most of the media reports make a big point that Theophane was very, very lucky to get the win in the end, as well as lavish praise on Murphy for his magnificent performance. Something I readily agree with especially knowing the circumstances surrounding the fight – Murphy took the fight at just a couple of days notice, fought at a higher weight division than he normally does and more importantly had been cut during the successful defense of his Southern Area Lightweight title just two weeks earlier.

As such I really wanted to get an inside track on this mighty warrior, as well as the fight itself, so rather than talk with Murphy so soon after the fight Instead I spoke with his coach Johnny Eames at  his famous fight factory The TRAD TKO Boxing Gym in Canning Town.

However before we get onto the interview with the esteemed Mr Eames I thought it sensible to give a very brief rundown on the fight for those that hadn’t been lucky enough to watch Murphy’s magnificent performance.

Murphy completed dominated the first half of the fight, he took the fight to the bigger man, pinning Theophane on the ropes and letting rip with nonstop venomous salvos, to win the first five rounds easily. Theophane had a little more success in the sixth, but still not enough I felt to win the round – mainly because it was clear that it was Murphy that was still in full control.

Round seven see the Tasmanian Devil Dog like Murphy completely tie up the champ, as in the early rounds, to secure the round, even though Theophane had managed to tear a nasty gash over Murphy’s right eye – On this point some reports say was the result of a left uppercut, whilst various of those present ringside, including his coach Johnny Eames, claim this was due to the dubious use of the elbow.

Either way at the end of the day Murphy was badly cut, something that clearly affected him, as such initially he seemed wary to go full pelt as previously, which allowed Theophane to actually gain some semblance of success for the next couple of rounds.

Round eleven sees Murphy fly out the traps and again take the fight to the Champ and keeps the pressure up for a minute or so. As soon as the major assault subsides Theophane starts one of his own. Theophane steps up the pace and continues to do so until the referee Howard Foster steps in and stops the fight on the 2 minute 33 second mark.

Interestingly many pundits disagreed with the ref stepping in and stopping the fight at this point, including myself, but it was surprisingly refreshing that Johnny Eames didn’t, something he explains during the following interview.

Rio -First question I have to ask is just how did this fight actually come about?

Johnny- Frank Maloney called me on Tuesday evening and asked me if Michael Grant wanted to fight Ashley Theophane for the British title as Nigel Wright unfortunately had a problem with his brain scan – obviously my sympathies go out to Nigel Wright, who’s a good friend of mine. I spoke to him up there and hopefully all will be all right once they get the second opinion – I said Michael wasn’t available and maybe he should try Peter McDonagh, who trains here in the gym.

Obviously the answer was that he couldn’t do it, so I said look I’ve got another guy here, who I don’t actually manage, but train and I’ll have a word with him, Ben Murphy, I said the only problem is he only fought two weeks ago and in that fight he got cut, so it was a big if Ben would be willing to take the fight.

That was a stupid question really, because I phoned Ben, maybe I should have rang his manager first but I always have a sort of special relationship with my fighters and I rang Ben he answered immediately I said do you want to fight for the British title Saturday, bearing in mind this was Tuesday and the answer was yes. He didn’t ask who, where, how much, what weight, nothing!

Obviously it was a step up in weight, which was a gamble, but I worked with Ashley (Theophane) for two or three years and I know Ashley quite well. I knew that Ben was the kind of fighter that Ashley really didn’t like fighting. The big question mark over the fight was it was two weeks since he fought and had been back in the gym once, all right he did a couple of runs and he always keeps himself fit.

We hadn’t prepared for it, but that’s all right because Ashley hadn’t prepared for us – then again how can you prepare for Ben Murphy – you know he was prepared to fight Nigel Wright, a southpaw, and now he’s got a little bull like animal who wants to rip his head off with every punch he throws.

Rio – You touched on my next question, normally Ben fights at Super Featherweight and Lightweight, didn’t you worry about him stepping up to Light Welter so quickly.

Johnny- If it had been any other Light Welterweight in the Country I might have been a bit concerned, but I know Ashley quite well, he aint what you call a big puncher, he’s quite accurate but not a big puncher so I knew Ben would be able to deal with the power.

Ben walks around at 10st 4lbs, 10st 5lbs and he makes Lightweight quite comfortably and he did make Super Featherweight for Prizefighter, so he’s pretty flexible. He’s a good liver so he can keep the weight on or take it off as it makes no difference for him, so we virtually fought at walking around weight.

Ben’s a different animal, yeah it was a gamble, but a calculated gamble.

Rio- Ben’s only been with you around six weeks or so, so I assume a lot of what we see was his normal fight style and not that you have bought much on board yet.

Johnny- When he came to me he had three weeks ‘til his Southern Area title defense, there’s nothing I can teach in three weeks, not even Superman could teach anyone anything in three weeks, and there’s a lot better trainers than me out there (Rio – I doubt there are many better, with the levels of Championship success Johnny has had over the years) that would tell you that you couldn’t teach anyone anything new in just three weeks, so we just had to make sure he was ready for a ten rounder, which he was.

After the first fight I said we’ll get you in the gym and I’ll start teaching you some of the things you need to know. He was due to be in this Monday to start our coaching for fights after Christmas.

Obviously it’s not how I want him to fight, but for Ashley it’s the way he had to fight. I spoke to him beforehand and said that there’s things I want to teach you to do, but said to him for this fight just go out there and do what you do, because he had to do what he does. It aint pretty but it’s effective.

Rio- Now I’m going to get onto the fight itself – unfortunately I couldn’t get up to Sunderland so I watched it on TV – I thought he did amazingly well and that the stoppage was early, but please tell me how you see that fight.

Johnny- I was amazed at how he could back Ashley up so easily in the first six rounds, I mean at first I thought Ashley was having a look to see what Ben’s got to offer. I knew he hadn’t prepared for Ben, all good fighters can adapt during a fight and Ashley is a good fighter.

As I said I thought Ashley was just having a look, then after the first round went, and then the second and then the third went I realised he couldn’t deal with it.

Ben was very fired up, I was asking Ben not to put power in every shot, unfortunately that side of it we haven’t taught him that yet and he just went round after round.

I had us win the fist six rounds, without a shadow of a doubt. For me personally I had us lose the next four, going into the eleventh I had us two up. I believe, no I know for definite because I spoke with the judges, that one judge had Ben five up going into the eleventh, one had him four up and one had him one round up.

In hindsight if I had known that I would have told Ben to go out there and hang on him for dear life, but not knowing if he’d be able to do that or not, because that’s not his style.

Everybody was in his favour, at the end of the tenth round, I think it was, he came back -  he was cut in the second round, it was a cut that he got two weeks before and we knew it would reopen, and then cut again in the seventh round – and he’d started to get beaten up a bit, I’m not someone that I’m not one for letting my fighters get beat up so I said to him unless you win this eleventh round I’m not letting you out for the twelfth.

Obviously partly to fire him up but also to make him aware he was taking too many shots. Unfortunately the referee didn’t let him get back to the corner, but a lot of people who watched it on TV said they didn’t feel the stoppage was justified, from ringside it was and Howard (Foster) did a good job, a very good job.

Ben did everyone of us proud, when we went back to the hotel the officials stood and clapped us in, I’ve never seen that before.

The bottom line is that it could open doors for Ben in his own weight division.

Rio -Again you’ve touched on my next question – what’s next for Ben.

Johnny – Ben is a Lightweight, he really is a Lightweight, he will do Lightweight again and he will be fighting at Lightweight in the next fight.

I’d love to think, and reading the reports and website that everybody thinks that Ben should be mandatory challenger for the British Lightweight title. I’d love to think he would.

Anthony Crolla is a good friend of mine, Joe Gallagher is a good friend of mine, but I’m pretty certain if they was watching that they wont be fancying facing Ben Murphy at Lightweight and I’m pretty certain that he could go and take the title from Anthony.

Rio- So if he does get the shot and wins the title, do see Ben progressing further than that?

Johnny- I never look beyond the British level with one of my fighters until they win it and defend it and then we look to see what’s around. The Lightweight division on the European scene is a very good division.

I’m not saying Ben aint good enough, but let’s see what happens with the British title first and then we’ll see where we go after that.

Rio- You’ve only had five weeks working with Ben, what’s your absolute honest opinion of him.

Johnny- The American trainer that was with Ashley said to me after the fight ‘put that man back in the cage, he should be on chains.’ That’s exactly what he is, he’s a total throwback, he’s not scared of anybody or anything.

When he was up here training with Bryan Lawrence, he’s a Lightweight but he was sparring with Middleweights because  the lighter weights didn’t want to spar with him. That’s the kind of kid he is and any fighter that has Ben’s attitude I’ll give them as much time as I can.

As a character and as a person he’s amazing, he’s just amazing you know I’ve never had a fighter with such a positive thinking way of fights. In his mind no one can beat him and he don’t care who he fights.

I just wish there were a lot more fighters like him out there. Fighters these days are picky, want to be guaranteed wins, this kid don’t give a shit, he’ll fight whoever you put in front of him.

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Friday, 21 October 2011

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By Gianluca (Rio) Di Caro

June 19 – 2011

On Saturday night close to fourteen hundred hardy souls braved the rain and packed the York Hall to capacity, stormy weather wasn’t going to stop them being ringside, at Spencer Fearon’s Hard Knock Boxing promotions ‘Summer Smash’ event, to watch former World Champs Choi Tseveenpurev (WBU/WBF) and Jackson Asiku (IBO) battle it out.

Was it worth it? Well there are fights and then there are FIGHTS, Choi-Asiku definitely comes into the later category. On paper it promised to be one of the best match-ups of the year so far, in reality it proved to be much, much more and the clear front runner for ‘Fight of the Year’ honours by a country mile.

The fight started a little slowly with Asiku controlling the first half of the round by keeping Choi at bay with crisp solid jabs. Around the one minute thirty mark Choi launched his first attack of the fight. After backing the Australian Based African to the ropes Choi let rip with a massive overhand right quickly followed by a double handed body assault.

Asiku responded with a big right of his own, but the savvy Mongolian wasn’t deterred one bit and launched a salvo of big right hands, uppercuts, hooks you name it Choi threw it. Asiku’s no mug and dug in his fully stocked arsenal and responded with equally venomous flurries. It was a close round to call but I gave it to Choi, he was plain phenomenal and I felt he had landed the more meaningful shots.

Round two was very much more of the same, these two warriors went to war with a vengeance. Any attempt to describe this round would be futile, it was probably one of the greatest rounds seen this year. Each matched the other punch for punch in an awesome display of the pugilistic art, it had it all, it was pure boxing heaven to watch these two in full flow for three sensational minutes. I see it as a 10-10 round as it was far too close to call one way or the other, they both scored big.

What a round, what an awesome round, these two are amazing, round two was sensational so how could they possibly top that, well they did as round three was even more…I’m lost for a word to describe it adequately, it was seriously class boxing from two World class boxers. At times they stood toe to toe and slugged it out, other times one or the other would launch a venomous attack. Every conceivable punch in the book was thrown time and time again. As before it was impossible to split them, they were equal in every way.

Round four was another beautiful round, early on Asiku switched to the body in an attempt to slow the forceful Mongolian, who would just respond with vicious hooks to the head. As the round progressed Choi turned the tables and started attacking Asiku to the body with a series of piston like hooks. It was beautiful boxing from two World class operators.

Round five see Choi start to dominate proceedings, first by continuing the all out assault to Asiku’s body and then with hooks and straight rights to the head. It wasn’t one way traffic by a long shot, Asiku made some wicked attacks of his own, just Choi was in a groove.

Asiku started fast in the sixth and aggressively took the fight to Choi. The diminutive Mongolian stood his ground, taking a few shots before letting rip with pin point accurate hooks and heavy rights. Asiku was determine to wrestle back control so just kept coming time after time. That is until around the two minute mark when Choi started unwinding the most venomous uppercuts which slowed the African considerably.

Not surprisingly Choi went hard on the attack in the seventh, having rattled Asiku the previous round, and got his just reward about midway through. Choi backed Asiku to the ropes and attacked the body before letting rip with a huge overhand right to the temple which sent the African to the canvas. Asiku quickly got to his feet but as soon as the count was done Choi went straight back on the attack, letting rip with bomb after bomb as Asiku switched to defensive mode to see the round out.

Rounds eight and nine see the pair go at it toe to toe again, slugging it out for virtually every second. As in the earlier rounds these two put on a stunning display of boxing, just at an even higher pace!

The tenth and final round was Choi’s without doubt. He started hard and fast forcing Asiku on to the back foot again. Asiku was responding but his shots just didn’t have the intensity of the previous rounds. Choi on the other hand seemed to find even more power and began landing seriously big shots at will until the final bell.

After ten scintillating rounds Choi was rightly declared victorious, by a 98-93 points margin, but in my view everyone was a winner, Choi, Asiku – who were both truly magnificent – and those of us lucky enough to be ringside for one of the best boxing matches anywhere for a long, long time.

Immediately after the bout Choi said, “I want to thank everybody in my team. I want to thank everyone that come tonight for their support, I love you everyone”

Promoter Spencer Fearon, who was at Choi’s side then added “I do the best fights and the best shows, I sell out York Hall, people come out for the energy, the passion. Hard Knocks does the best shows and give people what they want to see.

I tell ya, there has been no better fight this year and Choi is going to get another World title shot, I promise you he’ll get that title shot.”

The main support for Choi Tseveenpurev-Jackson Asiku was a proposed ten round battle, for the British Masters Light Welterweight title, between Southern Area champ Darren Hamilton and Midlands Area champion Dave Ryan.

I say proposed because the fight came to a very premature end, just one minute and forty two seconds of the first round. Hamilton, who had been controlling the first round easily, backed Ryan to the ropes and then lunged forward, head first, causing a nasty cut above Ryan’s left eye. The referee, Ken Curtis, instantly stopped the bout and disqualified Hamilton for the blatant headbutt.

The swing bout for the night, between ‘Slick’ Simon O’Donnell and Sergejs Savrinoviks, took place in front of a huge crowd, even though it was immediately after the main event. Have to say you don’t see that very often, usually the arena clears after the feature fight but not this time.

Throughout the bout O’Donnell controlled the fight with ease, keeping the ever forward coming Savrinoviks at bay with long jabs and double handed flurries. The second half of the bout see O’Donnell step up the pace and take the fight to Savrinoviks. The highlight of the bout came late in the third, when O’Donnell shook Savrinoviks to the core with a big right hand followed by a sharp hook. All in all It was an excellent display of boxing by the former Philadelphia based Middleweight and O’Donnell was rewarded by a well earned shutout 40-36 points victory.

Slotted in between the two main fights was an eight rounder Light Middleweight contest between West Drayton’s Steve O’Meara and Newark’s AA Lowe.

The first three rounds were closely fought affairs, with the pair matching the other punch for punch. O’Meara took control of the fourth after changing tact and started picking his shots. His more clinical approach started to pay dividends much to the annoyance of Lowe who in defiance turned to countering tactics.

Round five see a slight turn around with Lowe controlling proceedings with good sharp jabs. This time it was O’Meara that turned to countering in an attempt open things up. I gave this round to Lowe as he was not only the busier but also landed the more meaningful shots.

Normal service resumed in rounds six and seven with both protagonists going at it hammer and tongs. I gave both rounds to O’Meara though due to his higher and more effective work rate,

The final round was a barnstormer, Lowe’s corner made it clear he needed a stoppage to win and Lowe went all out to get it. O’Meara wasn’t ready to concede though and the assembled crowd were treated to a true battle royale as the pair slugged it out for the full three minutes. I have to admit I was a bit surprised that Steve O’Meara was declared victorious by a shutout 80-74 margin as I really feel that Lowe had done enough to take the fifth.

Prior to Hamilton-Ryan’s title fight Dagenham teenager Joe Catchpole and Scunthorpe’s Steve Spence locked horns in a rematch. When the pair first faced each other, back in November, the bout ended in a draw which gave the nineteen year old the only blemish on his otherwise perfect record.

No surprise to anyone that Catchpole was right up for the fight and had retribution on his mind, and boy did he show it.

Right from the off Spence pushed forward, putting the teenager on the back foot. Catchpole though appeared totally comfortable countering, even when backed onto the ropes.

Spence constantly tried to bully the youngster but Catchpole was having none of it. His countering and jabs were crisp and sharp and on the occasions the pair traded Catchpole seemed to get the better in each exchange.

As the bout progressed the youngster really came into his own, countering with double handed flurries of punches, and at times took the fight to the older man.

Just after the final bell rang Spence let rip with a very late punch to the head, Catchpole instantly reacted and let rip with a big left-right before the referee jumped in to separate them. After the kerfuffle retribution was well and truly served as far a young Joe Catchpole was concerned when he was declared the winner by a convincing 40-37 points margin.

The second bout of the night see unbeaten Alex Dilmaghani, from Worthing, Sussex, against local(ish) hero Mickey Coveney from West Ham.

The bookies favourite was clearly Dilmaghani, however what no one had taken into account is what a full on battler Coveney is, as everyone including Dilmaghani soon found out.

Right from the opening bell Coveney just kept going forward and working on the inside. This tactic completely neutralised the much taller Dilmaghani’s game plan. Each time he tried to keep the diminutive Coveney out with the long jab, Coveney would just duck under and get up close and personal to work the body.

The normally oh so classy southpaw Dilmaghani just couldn’t cope with the terrier like East Londoner, especially when backed on to the ropes, as was happening far to often.

Someone should have told Dilmaghani that Coveney has a habit of taking highly rated prospects precious ‘O’ because as sure as eggs is eggs Coveney went and did it again securing a nice well earned 39-38 against the odds victory.

The opening bout of the night see Hayes’ Robert Lloyd Taylor take on Leeds hardman Tommy Broadbent.

I have to say this was a cracking opening fight, like the rest of the card it was an evenly matched affair. The first round see the pair feeling each other out so was a bit slow at first, but once they settled down the action was superb. I personally gave Broadbent the first round as he settled the quicker and as such earned the round by with a better work rate and tidier shots. The second round was a very, very close hard fought affair, so close I see it a draw.

Taylor really started to exert his authority, taking control of the third with some great ringcraft and landing the more meaningful shots. The fourth and final rounds was more or less a repeat of the second with both going at it hammer and tongs for the full three minutes.

I have to say this was a really closely matched bout, both fighters were really up for it and the action was virtually nonstop, so I wasn’t at all surprised that when the scorecard was read out and showed a close 39-38 points difference – in favour of Robert Lloyd Taylor.

Spencer Fearon and Ciaran Baynes really know how to put on an event and give the public what they want, a night of top class action filled with genuine 50/50 fights.

I thought their Shamrock Showdown in March was quality, it was, but Summer Showdown took it to a whole new level altogether. What’s more I have never experienced an atmosphere like this at York Hall, it was electric, it was unreal, it was awe inspiring. I for one can’t wait for the next Hard Knocks Boxing show – bring it on.

Choi Victorious

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