Tonight at York Hall in London, England light welterweight Ted Bami made an unexpected opportunity pay off handsomely as the Brixton based man from Congo convincingly won the vacant European title on a Matchroom Sport promotion.
Guiseppe Lauri, 41-5 (24), of Italy was initially to have faced ex-European Lightweight titlist Jason Cook but the Welshman chose to retire from the sport due to a chronic shoulder injury and in stepped Bami, 21-2 (11), to take Cook's place.
From the start, Bami was the more powerful man in the ring and Lauri could barely cope with the clearly motivated African fighter for the first four rounds.
By the fifth frame, Bami was getting winded and not surprisingly, the experienced Italian import began to step it up a notch but was getting caught heavily by Bami in the sixth.
The remainder of the bout was closely contested but in the final stanza, Bami went to work once again and won over the judges with scores of 115-112 (twice) and 118-111 to annex the European Light Welter title.
On the undercard, former Commonwealth/IBO Light Middleweight Champion Richard Williams kept busy for his upcoming British Middleweight Championship clash with two time world title challenger Howard Eastman by defeating Croatian tourist Vedran Akrap, 9-5 (4), via fifth round stoppage.
Also, ex-British Welterweight Champion Young Muttley rubbed out Alexander Abramenko in the very first round of their scheduled six rounder.
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