By Charmaine Austin, Staff ReporterJAMAICA BOXING Board of Control president, Leroy Brown, still bears the afterglow from what he deems the success of last Saturday's eight-fight card in Portmore.
"The support was amazing and exceeded our expectations. Portmore is a thickly populated area and we managed, to a great extent, to get the idea across that this is something good and needs support.
"The quality of the boxing also exceeded expectations. It shows that what the boxers want is a lot of competition. Their exuberance and the evening on a whole brought back memories for me of the old time boxing days and we're hoping to have a lot more of this over the next year," Brown said.
Ken's Wildflower Lounge hosted the outdoor affair that welcomed a large, appreciative crowd for two hours.
The card, dubbed 'Fight Night at the Wildflower' featured amateur boxers from the Jamaica Defence Force, Stanley Couch, Job Walters and GC Foster gyms.
The soldiers in particular were using the event as warm-up for the World Army Boxing Championships that will be staged in Italy in December.
Olympic hopefuls Tse Tse Davis (GC Foster gym) and Ricardo Planter of Stanley Couch featured in the main bout and did not disappoint. Showing improved form from a recent training stint in Cuba, Planter stood up to the challenge from Davis in the middleweight contest but was defeated on points.
Juniors got the show under way and saw Orane Walters defeating fellow Anchovy High student Kamar Ricketts.
A featherweight bout followed with an improved Nicholas Walters going the four-round distance with soldier Shawn Whittle then winning on points.
Welterweight boxer Jermaine Vassell, fighting out of Savanna-la-mar gym, never made it to the second round against David Linton (JDF) as his corner deemed it fit to throw in the towel.
It was the same for Rohan Robinson of Smokin' Job gym who was unable to stand up to soldier Ricardo Brown in their middleweight contest.
The other two bouts saw Delgado Phipps (JDF) and Gilbert Vaz (JDF) winning their light heavyweight match-ups over Glen Thomas (Stanley Couch) and Gregory Ebanks (Savanna-la-mar) respectively.
The next card will be staged in October as the Board has set aside the month of September for planning.
