Raymond Narh stops Mabuzo in round two

Raymond Narh, the national super featherweight champion polished his fight record to eight wins in as many fights when he stopped Kaiser Mabuzo of South Africa in the second round of their scheduled 10 round lightweight contest at the Accra Sports Stadium on Saturday morning.

Narh, the former commonwealth amateur feather weight champion who was fighting for the first time in the lightweight class opened up early in the first round with straight left jabs to the face of his opponent. He followed up with solid right hooks to the head of the South African.

Mabuzo beat a retreat but not without a fight as he kept his hands busy and released some powerful right shots which failed to connect.

Narh accelerated, forcing the South African to quicken his backward dance as he thundered left, right combinations to the head and midsection of Mabuzo who connected a few left jabs and a right cross to the credit of the round.

When the second round began, Narh surged forward and delivered a barrage of sturdy combinations to the head of his opponent who failed to raise the level of his defences as he had done in the first.

Midway through the round, Mabuzo turned his back to Narh and raised his hands in surrender, compelling the referee to intervene as Narh corked to fire with the right. It was a second round technical knockout victory for the undefeated Narh.

What a dramatic end to a fight, which had received a lot of media hype and appeared to have a lot of promise when it started!

In one of the fights packaged by Jumus Promotions in association with Mascot Hotel, the African Super featherweight champion Kpakpo Allotey recorded a fourth round technical knockout win over Tosavi Louis of Nigeria.

The referee stopped the fight in one minute 33 seconds of the fourth round when Tosavi refused to continue after he complained Kpakpo had hit him on his genitals.

The African champion took the first three rounds easily and was never in trouble before the incident.

There was an upset when Philip Kotey stopped Lantekwei Hammond in round five of a scheduled 10 round catch weight contest.

Lantekwei dictated the pace of the fight and floored his opponent in the second round for a count of eight. Kotey appeared scared of his opponent after being subjected to severe beating in the first two rounds.

He connected a right in the fourth which seemed to have rocked Lantekwei and that was the turning point in the fight.

An exhausted Lantekwei became a steady target for Kotey in the fifth round and when referee Godfrey Cobblah failed to recognise a knockdown which he ruled a slip, Kotey hammered his opponent to the canvas and he needed the intervention of ring side doctors to regain consciousness.

In a national super bantamweight championship fight Alfred Tetteh was declared winner when his opponent Mohammed Laryea refused to continue with the fight in the sixth round in protest against a point deduction by the referee.

Laryea, who offered a good challenge in the first and second rounds lost control of the fight in the third and fourth as Tetteh subjected him to intense pressure, delivering series of punches to his head and face.

An apparently tired Laryea resorted to head butting and unlawful elbow punches, which attracted a warning from the referee.

Laryea's illegal tactics came to light again in the sixth round when he once again head butted his opponent and referee Coblah signalled the deduction from his points and this incensed the boxer who opted out of the ring, protesting against the decision.

Tetteh, who was by then leading his opponent on the scorecards of the three judges was declared the winner and was crowned the new national champion by Mr. Joe Aggrey, Deputy Minister of Youth and Sports.

In a ten round international bantamweight contest, Joseph Agbeko knocked out his South African opponent Cedric Conway in two minutes 55 seconds of sixth round.

Conway's corner threw in the towel in the round after blood started oozing from his nose due to the severity of punishment meted out to him.

Agbeko sent the South African to the canvas in the fifth with a right hook and later followed with some body punches to render him less effective.

Conway had the will to fight and indeed showed he could punch in the fourth and fifth rounds but Agbeko was a cut above him as he missed with all the swift rights that he targeted.