MAMOS IN TROUBLE

Manawatu Times, Volume 62, Issue 2, 4 January 1937, Page 10

MAMOS IN TROUBLE

HARD BOUT ON RAND JIM LONDOS TOO GOOD TIGEKMAN’S “BOUGH STUFF” NULLIFIED. An interesting story comes to New Zealand, through the medium of the Rand Daily Mail (Johannesburg), regarding a wrestling bout between Jim Londos and Harry (“Tigerman”) Mamos. It was a one-sided affair in which “Tigerman” might have been a kitten for all he was worth against a grappler who has been several times world champion. Here is the story:— Harry Mamos, the 190 pound “Tigerman,” spent a very disconsolate night at the Wanderers on a Saturday recently, for in addition to the discomforts of the raw and wintry atmosphere, he experienced some of the most inconsiderate treatment that any wrestler has ever received at the hands of a fellow grappler on the Rand. It was such an unpleasant night after the heavy showers of the afternoon that there was only one thing that could have brought the 3000 spectators out of doors, and that was Jim Londos, several times winner of the world heavyweight championship and holder of the biggest wrestling reputation ever brought to South Africa.

It was just as well that they did not come chiefly to see Mamos, as very little was seen of thfs gentleman most of the evening, except on the few occasions when he crawled into view from underneath Londos; and in any case by 10 o’clock he was fast asleep after two hectic aeroplane spins that ended in nose-dives to the mat.

Harry Mamos had promised the sports writers a few days previously that he was going to treat Londos “very rough.” Yet he can hardly be blamed for not carrying out this threat. For, after all, how can a man be expected to be rough when he is upside down or being tossed on to his nose most of the time? His best round against Londos was the first, but even here he disturbed the sturdy and heavily sinewed Londos about as successfully as a boy attacking a battleship with a peashooter. Londos pulled him off the ropes and buried him under a body-press, but presently Mamos squeezed his way out like the toothpaste from a tube and oozed to the outside of the ropes. Then Londos introduced the “Rock of Gibraltar.” That is to say, he gave Mamos his head and spread his feet so that Mamos, in trying to throw him to the mat, found it as easy as tossing a pillar box. The pillar box wouldn't have budged. Londos didn’t either! Mamos in Trouble. Then came round two, and Londos proceeded to exhibit some of the holds that had made him world champion, so that it wasn’t long before Mamos’ brow became as corrugated as the Main Reef Road in the old days, while his eyes began popping in and out like the stops of an organ. Londos fashioned him like plasticine, and transformed him into all kinds of different shapes and spectacles. Starting off with a Jack Knife and deevloping the cradle hold and varitions of the Boston Crab, Londos twisted him up so much that he could have supplied Africa with a year of belt buckles. Then he altered the shape of Mamos so that he resembled a deckchair—very much folded up. Referee W. Corner kept asking Mamos if he would even enjoy swallowing knives and forks and razor blades; and Mamos just gave the furrows on his brow an extra shake and his rolling eyes an extra roll and conveyed the impression that he would stay down for more. Londos duly obliged by clamping on the short-arm scissors and rolling his man round the mat like a cart wheel. Up to then Mamos hadn’t shown any nasty signs of resentment; but he became very angry after he had at last got up and Londos proceeded to stroke his nose the wrong way. That sort of rought stuff wasn’t in the rules, so he appealed to the referee and then put the splits on Londos and a little later used his elbow in the clinches. Alamos in More Trouble. Early in the third round Mamos again found that it was about as easy to headlock Londos as to throw Hospital Hill down Twist Street, and then Londos got busy again and for some minutes Mamos was tossed about like a marble in a soda-water bottle. By that time the promoters wJre getting worried about the state of the mat, as Londos was threatening to make holes in it with Mamos at any moment. And the public too were getting impatient to see the “kill,” as Londos had done enough to his man to signify that he had signed the execution warrant.

That “kill” duly came in the fourth round, when he seized two handfuls of Mamos’ wrinkles and tossed these and Mamos around the ring like a careless kitchen boy handling crockery. Then he picked him up and swished him round in an aeroplane spin, before crashing him on to the mat for the first fall.

Mamos sat on the mat during the interval and he was still groggily checking up the inventory of his belongings to see whether he was all there when the fifth round began. His seconds lifted him up and pushed him towards Londos, who just pancaked him around the mat for a bit and then took him for another ride in an aeroplane spin. After that Mamos’ seconds started looking for the pieces.