By Elliot Foster
Tyrone McCullagh claimed a title and put himself in line to fight for the British belt.
The Derry super-bantamweight, who is trained by Derry Mathews and George Vaughan in Liverpool, was dropped in the third round of his fight against Joe Ham. McCullagh, however, got up and outboxed the Scot over 10 scheduled rounds at the SSE Arena in Belfast.
He is now the Celtic title holder at eight-stone 10lbs and could vie for the Lonsdale belt after picking up a 97-92, 98-92, 98-92 unanimous verdict, as part of the supporting cast to Michael Conlan’s homecoming outing against former world title challenger Adeilson Dos Santos.
The fight took place exclusively live on BT Sport and BoxNation and McCullagh will face the winner of a July 27 vacant British title clash between his gym-mate Jazza Dickens and former challenger Martin Ward.
Details regarding the next move of McCullagh will be revealed in due course.
Also on the card, Johnny Coyle put himself further up the pecking order for a major title challenge with a hard-fought victory.
The 25-year-old Essex welterweight moved to 19-0-1 with two early finishes with a razor-thin decision win over Lewis Benson.
The pair clashed over 10 rounds, as part of the supporting cast to Michael Conlan’s homecoming outing against former world title challenger Adeilson Dos Santos at the SSE Arena in Belfast.
And Coyle won a rather dull affair by 96 points to 95, exclusively live on BT Sport and BoxNation, putting himself in pole position for a final eliminator for Bradley Skeete’s British welterweight title.
