MERSEYSIDE MEMORIES
Remembering the likes of Tiger, Mcateer, Cooke, Mccaffrey, Roderick, Davies and more
EBA correspondent ALL EBAS are on the lookout for new members, and recently the Merseyside Former Boxers’ Association were delighted to enrol Ron Brown, who boxed while serving in the army between 1949 and 1955. Ron represented the Royal Engineers (Southern Brigade), winning North African and Tripolitanian titles.
Ron’s enrolment is recorded in the Association’s monthly newsletter, Mug’s Alley, with the words “Welcome Ron – it’s good to have you with us.” No doubt Ron will have plenty of tales to tell of his career. However, as I’ve said before, you don’t need to have boxed to join an EBA. If you love the game, you’ll be made very welcome.
The current Mug’s Alley also includes a very interesting article on Nigerian Dick Tiger, who based himself in Liverpool for a time after leaving his homeland.
With the accent today so much on ‘preserving the 0’, it’s sobering to remember that Tiger lost his first four bouts over here. But he always went the distance, and learned, and improved, and the wins started coming. In 1957, he drew with Merseyside’s Commonwealth middleweight champion Pat Mcateer in a non-title bout in Cardiff. That set up a return for the belt the following year, which Tiger won by ninth-round KO.
In 1959, Tiger relocated to America, ultimately winning undisputed world championships at both middleweight and light-heavy. He died of cancer in 1971, aged just 42.
Merseyside also have an excellent website, www.merseyboxers.org.uk, and one of the links explains how the Association came to be. In 1973, the late Sydney Dye (boxing correspondent for the Liverpool Echo) was interviewing Merseyside ex-boxers for a series of articles. To quote the website, many of them “expressed regret that there was no form of association in being that they could belong to and meet up with former friends and opponents.”
Ex-pro Les Radcliffe, then a publican in Liverpool, asked Syd to place a column in the Echo, asking any interested former fighters to attend his pub to discuss the possibility of forming an ex-boxers’ association. Around 40 came, and that was the start of the Merseyside Association. Proof, again, of the power of the press – especially the local press.
Among those attending were old rivals Johnny Cooke and Brian Mccaffrey, who had a terrific 15-rounder in Manchester in 1967, with Cooke winning on points to take the British welterweight crown
vacated by Brian Curvis. Another fine ex-champ was Ernie Roderick, who ruled Britain at the same weight and challenged Henry Armstrong for the world title.
A number of ex-boxers from the Wirral also attended. The Wirral EBA was formed in 1974, under the chairmanship of the late Wally Thom (former British and European welterweight titlist, and later Star referee). Both Associations supported each other, with many members belonging to both – it’s the same today.
I’ve got some great memories of Liverpool Stadium in the ‘70s and ‘80s, watching and covering champions of the calibre of John Conteh and Joey Singleton. Merseyside Secretary Jim Jenkinson gave me one of his special Stadium memories: “It was 1978. Robbie Davies – local lightmiddleweight, unbeaten, very popular – took on an American named Johnny Heard, and lost on points.
“Afterwards, I went to the dressing rooms to get my programme signed. Johnny Heard came out of the shower, I congratulated him, and he said: ‘I can’t believe that I, a black man, would have got the decision over the home fighter. It wouldn’t have happened in America.’ I said: ‘Listen, if you hadn’t got the decision, all hell would have broken loose.’ The Liverpool supporters are fair. And Robbie had no complaints about the verdict.”
Heard came back in 1980 and met Davies again. This time he won by seventh-round KO.
DON’T MISS
TUE DEC 5: North Staffs EBA Christmas Dinner, London Road Sports and Social Club, 279 London Road, Stoke-on Trent. THU DEC 7: Bournemouth EBA Christmas Dinner, Parley Country Club, Ferndown. SUN DEC 10: Brighton EBA Christmas Party, The Nevill, Hove (12pm). SUN DEC 17: Home Counties EBA Christmas Party, Bricket Wood Social Club (12pm).