By Terence Dooley
At the Leisure Centre in Altrincham, Cheshirem Manchester’s Danny Randall kicked-off the Murray-Thaxton undercard, and his professional career, with a rousing four-rounds decision win over Coventry’s Abul Taher. Randall brought a sizeable cheering section along with him and they roared their man on from the first to final bell. Taher also played a big part in making this contest a small hall classic as he fought to preserve his own unbeaten record, he was 2-0 going in and boxed with a lot of confidence.
Danny (145¼lb) started fast and maintained this pace, forcing Taher (143½lb) to stand and trade more often than he would have liked to. A blistering second round blitzkrieg from Randall had the crowd roaring their fighter on, only for Taher to come out strong in the third round.
This hectic third round assault may have cost Taher a result, though, as he had little left for the final round. Randall paced himself well over the course of the contest and this economy paid off for him in the closing round. Despite taking some strong right uppercuts, Danny powered his way forward in the last stanza, taking the fight to the fading Taher.
It was a all-or-nothing contest, a shootout between two relatively light hitters who were both going for the stoppage win, a huge amount of leather was thrown, if not landed, and Randall, who was bruised under his right eye, was a deserved winner. Referee Steve Gray had it 39-38, with the first round split and Taher, presumably, winning the third.
Randall went to sit with his fans after the fight; he was still on cloud nine and could barely take it all in; he told BoxingScene that the fight had been just what he had wanted and he was positive that his noisy fan base would swell in numbers for his next engagement.
Taher falls to 2-1, he paid the price for emptying the tank during that all-out third round assault, it may have cost him a draw on the cards but it produced the fight of the night and the man from the West Midlands can come back strong from this loss.
Randall is off the mark, 1-0 and with a crowd-pleasing style; the local boxer should not be short of work over the coming year. Promoter Mick Hennessy liked what he saw; he believes that Randall’s vociferous support is going to add a bit of early-doors noise to any bill that features the former BT engineer.
Kid Galahad AKA Abdul Barry Awad (124½lb) produced an impressive undercard performance over the game but overmatched Pavels Senkovs (126¼lb). Galahad’s trainer Dominic Ingle believes that the Kid is the next big thing out of Sheffield and the Yemenite youngster proved his worth by boxing and banging his way to a second professional win.
Galahad switched stance at just the right times during the course of this victory, befuddling his opponent when boxing as a southpaw and landing solid blows when fighting in the orthodox stance. By the third session, Galahad was sitting on his shots, the youngster was clearly confident and, importantly, he has good balance for a switch-hitter.
Senkovs was nothing more than a punch bag by the closing seconds and the 40-36 scorecard turned in by referee Michael Alexander was a perfect reflection of the fight. Senkos falls to 1-7-1 (1); Galahad is on the gallop, he rises to 2-0 (0).
In other action the 6’ 8’’ Richard ‘High’ Towers (230lb) hammered Michal Skierniewski into a second-round stoppage defeat. Referee Michael Alexander called in the ringside doctor at the end of the second session to inspect a nasty, bloody cut on the left eye of the man from Poland and the fight was correctly waved off.
Towers, who boxes out of Sheffield, had things pretty much his own way during the six-minutes of action. The huge boxer peppered his opponent with solid shots and made a point of targeting the eye when the injury arose. Towers now rises to 4-0 (2) and he joins Tyson Fury as the next big thing at heavyweight; Skierniewski’s slate is now 3-6-1 (1).
Bob Ajisafe (180lb) and Phill Fury (155lb), who is Tyson Fury’s cousin, both posted solid marking time wins over Phil Goodwin (181½lb) and Louis Byrne (154lb) respectively.
Ajisafe’s fight was a six-rounder and the man from Darlington was a worthy 60-54 winner of the scorecard of Michael Alexander. Ajisafe is 8-1 (2), his only loss came against Carl Dilks in the light-heavyweight Prizefighter tournament; Hull’s Goodwin is 4-4 (1), he has lost 3 of his last 4 and desperately needs to get back on the winning trail.
Fury, who boxes out of Manchester, blotched his copybook when losing a point for a low blow in round three of his four-rounder but was generally punch perfect in posting a 39-37 win on the scorecard of referee Steve Gray. Phill improves to 3-0 (1); Byrne is 1-9 (4) and has not won since defeating fellow journeyman Chris Brophy in 2007.
Finally, Kris Hughes (125½lb) had an early night’s work as he dispatched Dai Davies (125¼lb) in the first round. Hughes took a shot or two himself before tucking Davies away at 2:01 of the opener.
Hughes is now 9-0, this was his first stoppage win and the man from Bellshill, Scotland will no doubt be buoyed by the dramatic nature of his KO victory. For his part Merthyr Tydfil’s Davies, now 6-11-1 (1) returned to the dressing room shaking his head; he came into this contest fresh of a Welsh Area Flyweight title win over Robbie Turley and he will have expected to at least test his 21-year-old opponent.
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