By Elliot Foster
Daniel Keenan lost his undefeated record on Saturday on a world title fight undercard.
The former Dale Youth ABC amateur was shocked on points by Angel Emilov, exclusively live on ITV Box Office.
Keenan, managed by Steve Goodwin, was beaten by the Hungarian at the SSE Arena, Wembley, on the same bill as George Groves’ WBA Super super-middleweight title defence against Jamie Cox in the World Boxing Super Series.
The hometown man struggled to get in to the fight, if truth be told and, after giving Keenan problems across the distance, it was Emilov who walked away with the decision by 39 points to 38 on the referee’s scorecard.
Also on the bill, Mikael Lawal scored his second win in four weeks.
The undefeated 22-year-old cruiserweight moved to 4-0 (3 KOs) after leaving Tomislav Rudan needing medical attention in the second of four scheduled stanzas.
Lawal, who was winning the fight with relative ease anyway, unleashed arguably the best punch of his career –– a right uppercut –– to ensure that he would be victorious.
Thankfully, after paramedics entered the ring, Rudan returned to his stool and his dressing room as Lawal had his hand raised.
And Michael Devine got his 2017 campaign underway with a convincing points victory.
The reigning Southern Area lightweight champion outpointed ‘Mad Man’ Michael Mooney over four rounds, with referee Howard Foster scoring the contest 40 points to 36 in favour of ‘Chunky’.
In the opener, Chris Billam-Smith began proceedings didn’t waste any time, dispatching Serbia’s Aleksandar Todorovic (11-14-1) within the first round.
The Shane McGuigan-trained fighter extends his record to 2-0 after making his debut in Bournemouth last month.
Meanwhile, Youssef Khoumari was rarely tested as he comfortably defeated fellow Brit Jamie Speight on points, Dean Richardson delivered a perfect punch performance as he made light work of Slovakia’s Andrej Moravek, stopping the Slovakian with two seconds remaining in the second round and Kirk Garvey won his third straight fight since losing his undefeated record to Colin Farricker.