Peau for Rarotonga

Press, 28 July 1987, Page 8

Peau for Rarotonga

PA Auckland New Zealand boxing chiefs are fighting to get outstanding heavyweight boxer Jimmy Peau into the Oceania championships. The Commonwealth Games champion abandoned his planned departure from Auckland to look after his ill wife and new-born child. He is due to leave this afternoon for Rarotonga, but his flight lands well after the scheduled weigh-in. Peau pulled out of the New Zealand team less than an hour before the boxers’ Auckland departure on Saturday. His wife gave birth to their first child on Friday. The chairman of the Box-

Ing Council, Allan Walker, said last evening that Peau’s wife had a kidney problem which had affected the health of the baby. Both were in a “serious condition” at the time the team was due to leave. “However, the emergency is now over and Jimmy is quite prepared to go — and his wife is quite happy for him to travel even though she has not fully recovered. But the baby Is quite stable," Walker said. Walker is now making a desperate attempt to persuade Oceania boxing executives to delay the heavyweight final weigh-in for 24 hours to allow Peau to make his fight