BOXING

Southland Times, Issue 19546, 9 May 1925, Page 17

BOXING

IBy

“Punch.”)

Jimmy Hill will be back in the Dominion I shortly. J. Kelly registered a good win when he beat D. Sutherland, of Dunedin, at Bluff. Failing to get matches in Australia Hughie Dwyer has come to New Zealand. His first match will be at Napier against Eddie Parker. The Northern (Auckland) Association has written to Australia for an opponent for Purdy, and mentions Godfrey, Spargo or , Fairhall for preference. Neither of the first 1 two is available, and Fairhall may not feel i disposed to come, having good prospectsof ; matches in Sydney. After fighting in twenty contests with I Canadians and Americans, the British ama- I teur boxing team returned home recently | with the proud recoici of sixteen wins. ' During the tour, J. Elliot, the English 1 amateur. middle-weight champion, did not lose a fight. The largest number of defeats i for an individual boxer was two. Much- of the team’s success was due to the training • of Joe Bowker, ex--bantam-weight champion i of the world? who accompanied it. The . boxers were impressed with the huge crowds i that watched the fights, for 10.000 people attended at Boston, and 14,Cud at New York. An American writer, Grantland Rice, supplies the following: Say it with cauliflowers, say it with gloves; Say it with uppercuts, right hooks and shoves; Say it with left jabs; say it with slams, i Oh, give us the music of the leather-covered ' hams. Say it with knock-outs, where necks are I rough, Where the pied pipers are crooning their ■ stuff; Biff; bang and blooie! Oh, bring on the thud. Say it with black eyes, red welts and blood! Say it with resin, footwork and clout, Say it with millions plucked for each bout; Shoot with the swish now, we are the fish now, Slip us out the dish now—eight, rime and out! There is none so deaf as he who will not hear! Archie Bradley, Queensland’s whirlwind fighter, in his contest with Les .Darton, at Brisbane, was reluctant to knock off for the minute spell between rounds, and : on several occasions continued punching ■ after the gong had sounded. The Belgian, i speaking in French to his mentor, Henri ; Demlin, remarked innocently: “It’s sad i about Monsieur Bradley losing his hearing, isn’t it ? He must be very deaf, for he never seems to hear the gong!” Mrs Dempsey evidently thinks one part- ( ner enough for Jack, and reports are persistent that the world’s champion has cancelled his partnership with Jack Kearns. Despite these, and alleged statements confirming them by Dempsey, Keans continues to talk as though still entitled to the fiftyS*, i fifty rake-off from the champion’s earnings. 4 ] There is no doubt that Kearns’s coaching j I and shrewdness put Dempsey in his present , position as champion, but after all, it is Jack who has to take the knocks, and suffer j other little inconveniences connected with ■ his job. Even from Jack’s vaudeville earn- I i ings of 4000dois a week, his astute adviser i has taken his 50 per. No wonder Estelle, ! i who doubteless is of the opinion that the ! Dempsey menage is going to cost more than it did before her addition to the establish- i ment, looks upon Kearns with a cold eye. I American papers credit Estelle with being a | sensible young woman and quite able to control the family purse. Roland Todd’s first appearance in England since his return from America proved disastrous. In between he lost his European title at Milan to the Italian, Frattini, and back in England he showed in his 20 rounds contest with Len Johnson ,at Manchester, how far he has gone back since he beat Kid Lewis for the middle-weight championship. Johnson, a coloured boxer of real promise, i won on points by the use of a good straight I left and better ringcraft. Todd’s attack ■ was. if anything, weaker than before. His ; defence was fair, but Johnson was wise en- ' ough to rule the fight, so that Todd was ■ made to do all the leading—tactics that will i always beat a boxer of his type. , Says an Australian writer in Smith’s I Weekly, describing a fight between George ; Saunders and Klick Turner, two Sydney boxers: —“Mr Saunders is a halfcaste abo., ; thinner than a stick of spaghetti, and disi playing more ribs than the museum whale, ! and arms like animated church-warden pipes. Mr Turner’s chief claim to fame proved to be a really weird and wonderful hair-cut. Nothing like it has ever been seen in Sydney before. He resembled a badly-scalped settler in a Wild West movie. Quite early I it was apparent that all Mr Turner’s ring i qualifications were centred in his hair-cut ' and his stout heart. He should sell gloves |—not swing them. What he doesn’t know i about boxing would fill the whole 10 vo- ; lumes of Charlie Bean’s history of the An--1 zacs, an then there’d be eriough over to crowd a new Fox’s Book of Martyrs. The skinny Saunders hit Mick with *very punch known and practised since cruel Gain smack- ■ ed affable Abel. Mainly owing to the fact \ that Mr Saunders would find it a gargan.I tuan task to up-end a knob of blue, Mr Turner was still on deck at the end of the stipulated four rounds.” I Jim Pettengell, who was a prominent i figure in the New Zealand ring some thirty ; odd years ago recently died in Sydney of ! pneumonia. After his ring career had ended 1 he fell upon evil times. He became almost ! totally blind and eked out a living by sell- | ing matches in streets. Pettengell was l born a? Netley, Hampshire, England, on I July 21, 1863, and stood about sft 9in and weighed about Hi stone. He came to New Zealand. So far as my records show (says a Christchurch writer) he first fought in New Zealand at Wellington, on November 17, 1884, his opponent being Perry, who was knocked out in the third round. From then on for about six years he travelled all over New Zealand, meeting all-comers, big and little, seldom defeated. Two men proved more than his match, however. Dick

Matthews and Harry Laing. Amongst the others that Pettengell met were Ike Fake, Teague, Barney-Donovan (father of Harry Donovan, Charlie Purdy’s trainer)’ and Harry Dunn (the champion wrestler). Pettengell’s last fight in New Zealand Was against Dick Matthews, at Greymouth, on June 21, 1890. Matthews, who was an American, paid two visits to New Zealand. On the first he easily vanquished all opponents he met and was regarded as champion. Going back to- California, his native State, he first met Brady for the championship of the Pacific Slope, and the battle was the most sanguinary ever seen in the State. Both men were terrific punchers- and they fought in the skin gloves. The' fight finished both of them, the fearful punishment they received affecting them mentally and physically. When Matthews returned to New Zealand he was but a shadow of bis former stalwart manhood and was easily beaten. Going to Sydney, Pettengell had a number uf fights there, probably the best man he met being Dummy Mace. f for some little space Billy Grime, dual chaippion of Australia—feather and lightweight—has strutted and slapped his way to increasing fame, in the period handing many a victim a one-way ticket to the land of oblivion. Now some of the Aussie critics think he never could scrap, and all because in a contest at Sydney with Tommie Fairhall, the best he could do was to escape (with a doubtful draw. Verily, pne day a champion tastes of the wine of adulation and the next has to content himself with the dregs from the small-beer pot. Certainly, he ought to have stopped Thomas, but perhaps he had a liver or his head ached owing | to a bout with his income-tax form. For Thomas went into the ring severely handicapped through a injured left arm. Despite this affliction he sent William to the canvas three times, but, although in pacific mood, the champion refused to claim exemption and went on with the game. Most of the spectators resented Grime holding his open left glove many times against Fairhall’s jaw and waiting, in some instances, about four seconds, to see whether he could get a right-hand punch’over to the jaw, but Fairhall was too wary to be caught napping. However, the action of Grime went towards spoiling the match. Although there was plenty of work done, there was a lack of scientific work. Most of the first half saw Fairhall forcing the contest, but in the second half Grime attacked more than the challenger for the title. Since the fight, I which went the full distance, several of the i Sydney papers have suggested that Stadiums Ltd., should appoint some old boxers who know the science of the game, to coach present-day boxers up to the higher standard that ruled in the past. A testimonial dinner given to 'Benny Leonard, the retired world’s light-weight champion, at the Hotel Astor, New Aork, on March 15, was attended by over one thousand persons, including distinguished ' men of affairs, society leaders and outstanding representatives of the literary, theat- ; rical and sporting world. It was the first time that a professional fighter had been so honoured. Leonard announced that he would henceforth devote himself largely to developing and improving the physical fitness of the American people. “For years it has been my ambition to serve the public by passing on to them the methods I found most valuable in converting myself from a weak, unhealthy boy to a world’s champion fighter,” Leonard said. “I retired from the ring two months ago for reasons that I believe are compelling and logical. I believe now as I did then, that I am right. I never expect to fight as a professional again. I feel that the work I am now going to devote myself -to is bigger than defending the world’s championship. In order to put this ambition of mine in practical form I have been for several years organising my ideas and working out a course in physical culture based on my experience. At last I have perfected it. For some time now a ! number of my friends have been training 1 in their homes under my direction and the ■ results have been very gratifying to me. i Leading physical culture authorities have I told me that my ideas are sound and effective and have encouraged me to take up this work in a big way. I am throwing myself into the work heart and soul, and its success means more to me than anything I have ever undertaken before.” PORRITT. “A FEATHER LN NEW ZEALAND’S CAP.” The success of Porritt, the Otago athelete, at Saturday’s athletic fixture is a great ! feather in New Zealand’s cap, for this year’s • Light Blues have been declared by Alec I Nelson, their coach, as the team of finest all-round merit that he has had through his i hands for some years. The London Observer’s notice says: “Having regard to the wintry conditions and the cross wind, the j performances were excellent. Porritt, the ( gentleman from Otago, who has had some trial spins at Queen’s, lived up to his private reputation as a sprinter, for his time over the hundred yards was a record for this series of inter-University struggles. Macmillan and Abrahams were each twice tcredited with even time, but Porritt had the ] tremendous satisfaction of beating evens I by one-tenth of a second, which, of course, equals one yard. Getting beautifully out of the holes, he was leading by two yards when sixty yards had been covered, and all ! that Rinkel could gain upon the New ZeaI lander from that stage was half a yard. I Porritt afterwards competed in the 120 'yards and 220 yards hurdles, both these 'races were won by Lord Burghley, who, if ! slower between the jumps, was a more i natural fencer, for he virtually walked them I in the American style, while Porritt rose in | the old conventional manner with a tuckedup leg. There is no doubt whatever that Lord Burghley is very accomplished at this exercise, for his time over the shorter distance was within a “fifth’ of K. Powell, and his rare finishing power in the 220 yards, when Porritt looked like succeeding, produced 24 4-ssecs, which is a second better than even Huhn could do two years ago.” SPLENDID INFLUENCE. TEAMS ON TOUR RUGBY PRESIDENTS VIEWS. These tours should not be regarded solely from the football standpoint, for there is no doubt that the visits of touring athletic teams from one part of the Empire to another have had a splendid influence in helping to hold us all more closely together, and in making us feel that all men of the British race belong to one family. In his address to delegates at the annual general meeting of the New Zealand Rugby Union the President, Mr H. Frost, of Auckland, referred to the tour of the All Blacks to Great Britain, Ireland, France and Canada as the outstanding event of the past year’s operations, and at the same time he emphasised the importance from various points of view of tours of that nature. It was hard, he said, to add anything new to what had already been said by many others about the New Zealand team’s great triumphs. Bui it would, of course, be a very great satisfaction to the delegates, as it was to him as President, to know that the All Blacks had played magnificently, and had put up a record that, although it might perhaps one day be equalled, could never be beaten. “I may add,” said Mr Frost, “that we are all proud, not only of their splendid series of victories, but of the good reputation they earned for themselves as well-conducted and self-respecting young athletes wherever they went. It is especially pleasing that the Maori race was so ably represented in the team, and Nepia’s wonderful record is the greatest tribute to their prowess as athletes. EFFECT OF TOURS. “As to the effect of these tours upon the game out here, no one can doubt that the experience thus ( 'gained has been of the highest value to our men, and will enable them to assist in raising the level of skill and improving the tactics and strategy

of Rugby in’ New Zealand for many seasons to come. That was certainly the effect of the All Black tour of 1905, and no doubt the same result? will follow now. Bujt these tours should not be regarded solely from the football standpoint, for there is no doubt that the visits of touring athletic teams from one part of the Empire to another had a splendid influence in helping to hold us all more closely together, and making us feel that all men of British race belong to the one family. And from what I can learn of our boys’ experiences in France,’ tours of this sort certainly have good effects elsewhere, by helping us to understand other nations, and by engendering friendly and kindly feelings all round. “I am hoping that the proposal fcr a French Rugby team to visit us will materialise withouT undue delay, and I am sure that such a visit would prove one of the greatest events in the h'«tory of (be game. “In addition to all this, I think we can fairly claim (hat our AH Blacks have been a splendid advertisement for New Zealand. NOT TOO OFTEN. “Now there is another aspect cf these tours that I want to mention. While they are a wonderful experience for the men who take, part in them, they mean giving up work for many months on end, and under present conditions this means very heavy expense. I am sure players out here—nearly all being working men- cannot afford either the time ot the money to make such trips ohen. In my opinion it would be a great mistake to think seriou ly about further long trips under existing conditions for some time. Most cf the men who went Home this time will probably be at the top of the tree for sonje seasons, and we could not expect them to drop work and spend all that time and money again so scon. TOUR THROUGH NEW ZEALAND. [ “The value of the recent trip, however, I cannot be too highly' praiied, and if there is one regret it is that the New Zealand | public have not haxl the of ( seeing these players in combination on their own playing fields.”