WRESTLING Marconi Loses In First Christchurch Appearance

Press, Volume XCII, Issue 27734, 11 August 1955, Page 14

WRESTLING Marconi Loses In First Christchurch Appearance

The Dominion Wrestling Union, keeping pace with that other august body, the M.C.C. selection committee, has introduced some new faces into its end-of-season team. Its latest face, the property of Frank Marconi, would terrorise a batsman to whom Tyson is a tyro, and it makes the Great Zorro look like a Michaelangelo cherub. Marconi is said to be the most hirsute and roughest wrestler to have passed through that academy of fine arts, the Sydney Stadium, and on both counts he passed muster when he met Lucky Simunovich at the Civic Theatre last evening. Simunovich won, after four pedestrian rounds and three of startling brevity and brutality. A large crowd enjoyed all seven. Marconi lacks the inventive genius of his famous namesake, but he does have a 56-inch chest and weighs 19st 21b. This is half a stone lighter than he was .when he was 14 years old, according to the programme, but the same source gives his present weight as 18st 31b. Neither the Railways Department nor the National ’ Airways Corporation, enjoy a reputation for lavish hospitality, but they can hardly be held responsible for this phenomenon. Marconi’s other claim to fame is a pair of bushy, Victorian sideburns which swing sharply inwards below the cheekbones and offer unscrupulous opponents a novel hand-hold. Simunovich, who had apparently lost four pounds in weight since Monday evening, did well to beat this arch-villain, but then he has been Marconi’s opponent in each of the newcomer’s three New Zealand bouts, and has had, as it were, a good look at the bowling. Marconi had the crowd hooting him happily half-way through the first round, but he could not point to many other achievements. He made more ineffectual appeals to justice than Nationalist China, but as soon as Simunovich began to share his party games he backed away, waving a beseeching hand before him. 1116 first four rounds were very ordinary, Marconi wallowing in villainy, and Simunovich barely surviving, but having his moments of triumph. The one bright and original moment was in the third round, when Marconi twice broke out of full Nelsons. He was so impressed with his magnificent strength that he turned his back on Simunovich to offer him the hold for the third time. Simunovich, nothing if not a realist, elected to drop-kick his op-

ponent in the back, sending Marconi rocketing into the ropes, for all the world like a runaway barrage balloon. A little, later Simunovich, holding Marconi in a body scissors while seated comfortably behind him, lifted his opponent and dashed him to the floor, setting up vibrations the other Marconi would not have recognised, but which seemed to last minutes, like a jelly carried by a nervous waitress. Then there was some boxing, presumably because the wrestling was i not satisfactory to any of the parties. In the fourth round the pace quickened considerably, and Marconi leapt about like a fugitive from the Garden of Eden. When things became uncomfortable for him, as they did two or three times, he retired from the ring for brief periods of contemplation, but in the fifth round he was back in business, knocking Simunovich out of the ring, with some hearty kicks among the main methods of propulsion. Simunovich went over the civic organ and fell into the aisle, suffering a cut on the forehead. He had the consolation of a penalty fall. The sixth round had barely begun before Marconi, after a shower of elbow jolts, had applied a Boston crab which brought him a fall and which he did not leave nearly quickly enough for the spectators, and the same frantic haste brought the bout to an end early in the seventh round. Simunovich took a fall after a spectacular dump, to remain bloodied but unbowed. With Simunovich and the referee departed, Marconi demanded to know who had won, and put an unconvincing hand to a frustrated brow when he heard the news. But he has another side. On his farm in Ohio he grows peaches, also of magnificent dimensions. AMATEUR BOUTS Several amateur wrestlers from Timaru took part in the preliminary bouts at the Civic Theatre last evening. In five bouts, no falls were recorded. Results were:— D. Mitchell (Timaru). fet 131 b, drew.with B. McNeil, 7st 21b; D. Keats. 9st 61b, beat G. Edgeler (Timaru), on points; D. Jackson. list 21b. beat T. Wilson (Timaru). list, on points; D. Jackson (Timaru), lost 51b, beat R. O’Brien, lOst 41b, on points. G. Hobson, list 101 b, drew with D. Boyle (Timaru), 12st 41b.