NO SLIP UP

Andy Whittle watches Ellis shine as all four home boxers triumph

ANOTHER show plagued by woes beforehand and which just a few days earlier had seemingly been on the brink of being pulled finally went ahead at the North Nottinghamshire Arena. In front of a decent and oft noisy crowd, a quartet of four-round bouts, all of them overseen by Dudley’s Shaun Messer, were served up to the appreciative onlookers.

First up, after a momentary delay due to issues with the ring lighting was unbeaten Nottingham puncher Ryan Amos, and he encountered little by way of trouble in besting Luke Middleton from nearby Langold, who increasingly outworked picked up a slightly bloodied nose along the way. The 40-36 scoreline at the finish came as no real surprise. Massively popular local debutant Marcus Ellis, who excelled as an amateur, was in no mood for hanging around against Blackpool novice Kyle Boothman and needed just 78 seconds to secure a knockout win. A little over the welterweight limit, but looking a division bigger than his opponent, Ellis began with a decent right. When he repeated this and followed it in with a left cross, barely a minute later, Boothman was down, showing no inclination to beat the Dudley official’s count. Another local, super-welterweight Declan Cairns, ran out a 40-37 points winner against George Rogers of Whetstone in Leicestershire. Though victorious, he didn’t have things all his own way against an opponent who wasn’t there just to make up the numbers. In the evening’s closing contest, Joe Underwood-hughes of Beeston in Nottingham maintained his 100 per cent record with a shut-out victory over Oldhambased Zimbabwean, Taka Bembere. The underdog did not pose much of a threat but did enjoy a modicum of success after going southpaw late on, sufficiently as to leave Joe with a swelling beside the right eye.