TUNNEY COMES INTO HIS OWN

Hawera Star, Volume XLVII, 28 July 1928, Page 5

TUNNEY COMES INTO HIS OWN

A MAS mil OF HJS CRAFT.

COM MENTS ON THE FIGHT

NEW YORK, July 27

“Gene Tunney came into inns own hi> t nignt,” sav-s tne sports expert, J«un«a Dawson,-ox the “Now York Danes'.” ‘‘lighting i'll defence of the world’s hea.vy-weight title for the- first, time in his home town, the finest heavy weight ring monarch New York has known hammered: Tom Hioeney into submission in e.even rounds of a, scheduled fit teenround .struggle at the Yankee Stadium. The plaudits, of the crowd oi about 40,000 -rang, warmly in Tunney's ears in acknowledgement of a, conquest seated with al 1„ the method and system of a. highly skilled workman.’’ Dudley Nichols, in the “New York World,” says: “Tunney proved his rig;ht t-o the- heavyweight- title ’’jais-t. night when Referee Fon-bes .stopped: the championship bout eight -seconds before the end of the eleventh round and loci the wobbling New Zealander to- Ids corner. The .referee’s action just pievented Tunney’s demonstrating some applied poetry. The champion bad ,S'3nt isix lefts straight to the blacksmith’s face, which, was covered with blood. Heeney wa.s half-blinded.” “Heeney, gamely pressing an uphill fight, went to pieces- in the tenth round, which term mated with, a- h-a-rd knock-down just before- the gong sounded. Tunney fouiaht like a champion. and hie fa-ce and body were unmarked, at the finish, except for -splotches of blood which bad fallen on him l.rom Heeney’s crimson f-ace, but Heeney won the- crowd from the c-oimnenrement when bo bored in, grimly smiling, with his head lowered over his shaggy, deco chest.” The newspapers a,re practically un-an-imouis in -stating that Tex Rickard must have at least a quarter of a million dollars on the bout. It i.s- generally agreed that the crowd did not exceed 40,000 with receipts estimated at 650.000 dollars gross. As Rickard’s gua,ranters to the fighters -alone amounted to 625.000 dollars, there is no- room for doubt that he met with the first big financial failure in his experience a-si a- promoter.

AFTER- THE FIGHT. TENNEY DENIES HEENEY’S ALLEGATIONS. * NEW YORK, July 20. Tn the dressing room -after the fight Heeney* said: “Tunney’s thumb was stuck in mv eye as wo squared off in the eighth round and I could see nothing bv that eye from then on.” In the dressing room Tunney paid a tribute -to Ileeney’is rugged ga men css, adding: “T made him fight m v fight for ine. The referee should have stopped the contest in 'the eighth round when 1 paralysed Ileeney’s optic nerve with a hard right just above the eye.” Indignantly denying that he poked his gloved thumb ‘in 'the eye, Tunnov added that it was a. hard, clean right that started him 'blinking.