Charlie edged out by National champ
AT the start of another busy weekend on the road for Hamer Amateur Boxing Club, Austin “Powers” Heneghan, 13, travelled to Saint Pauls Working Man’s Club in Blackburn on Friday 24th September to take on local boxer Tyree Holden of Accrington Lions.
On the sound of the first bell, Austin stormed out of the blue corner eager to take the fight to the Accrington Lions boxer by landing a solid right hand to the chin.
Both boxers raised the volume within the room as they stood toe to toe exchanging punches.
But it was the Hamer boxer who had the slight edge as Heneghan took the centre of the ring to force Holden onto his back foot.
The Hamer youngster set an incredible pace again in the second round as he continuously connected with his right hand to the head of Holden, who was stimulated by the noise coming from his excited supporters, which motivated, and encouraged him to continuously step back into the action and exchange more blows with the Hamer boxer.
Before the start of the third and last round, Austin was told by his coach Steven Connellan, that he believed that he was winning but not to take it for granted.
He told the Hamer boxer that Holden would come out all guns blazing with the intention of regaining the momentum and the win, so he told Austin to bite down hard upon his gumshield and continue to take the fight to his opponent.
The round went as planned, when Holden rushed at Heneghan whilst unloading another barrage of punches, yet Heneghan stayed calm and as the Accrington boxer rushed towards him Austin calmly stepped back onto his back foot to unload solid right hands to the chin.
This continued throughout the round, which gave Austin the victory by unanimous decision.
Hamer ABC later learned that Austin and his opponent Tyree Holden were also awarded the fight of the night, which gained Heneghan another trophy.
On Saturday 25th September, Hamer ABC were on the road again when they travelled to the Vertu Arena, in Newcastle-uponTyne with their new NorthWest Region Schoolboy Champion, “Champagne” Charlie Braddock.
Charlie was to meet Muhammad Safari of The Ring Boxing Club, in the
National Schoolboy Semifinals.
After a long day, which started at around 7am, Charlie finally stepped into the ring to meet Safari at around 6.30pm that evening.
The bell rang for the first round and the Hamer boxer stepped right into the action, ready to exchange punches with his opponent, who immediately began to use his experience to land his southpaw left hand as Charlie stepped towards him.
This happened throughout the round and although the Hamer boxer managed to gain some success, his coach Connellan knew that he was slightly behind, so before the start of the second round, Connellan told Braddock to keep his guard high and wait for Safari to come towards him before unloading his right hand and if his opponent waited, then Charlie should step in close to unload his punches to both the body and head.
The bell rang for the second round and the Hamer boxer immediately stormed after his opponent with continuous punches. Charlie was forcing Safari upon his back foot again and his opponent was constantly warned by the referee for holding and putting his head down.
Then for what ever reason only known to the referee he gave Charlie a standing eight count. The Hamer boxer was forcing the action throughout the round as he constantly forced his opponent to step back, yet when he landed a punch at the Hamer youngster as he came towards him, it mysteriously prompted the referee to administer a standing eight count, which baffled the Hamer corner and the crowd in attendance.
Connellan knew that Charlie was losing the bout, so he told his boxer to go out all guns blazing and continue to take the fight to his opponent.
The bell rang for the third and final round and Charlie stormed out once again to take the fight to his opponent.
Safari used his experience again as he waited for the Hamer youngster to step towards him, before landing his left hand, for some unknown reason the referee stepped into break-up the action again to administer Safari two warnings for actions not seen by the crowd.
The Hamer boxer continued to step into the action and force Safari onto his backfoot.
Then with only eight seconds to go, the referee bizarrely stepped between the two boxers again to administer Charlie