GEORGE COOK IS RETURNING TO AUSTRALIA.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18010, 22 November 1926, Page 9

GEORGE COOK IS RETURNING TO AUSTRALIA.

TALKS OF BOXING AND BOUTS IN THE STATES. (Special to the “ Star") WELLINGTON. November 22. It is six years since George Cook defeated Albert Lloyd in the Town Hall at Wellington to win the heavy-weight championship of Australia, and to-dav Cookg;ot another peep of the city when he arrvied on the Tahiti after five years abroad. “ I am going back to Australia,” he said when interviewed. “ I’m not seeking any scalps in particular. I don’t know just who is over there, but I want to try and get back that championship which I vacated if I can. I’ve fought fifty or rixty times while I was away, good fights most of them, and I’m satisfied. I was in England and around the Continent for quite a while and then went to the States. “ One of my best fights there was against Jack Sharkey, who won from Wills in New York last month on a foul in the thirteenth round. Sharkey is now considered to be the logical contender for the title held by Gene Tunney. I met him a year ago in Boston and he got the decision at the end of ten rounds, but I know that 1 won seven rounds in the ten, and I have never seen such a demonstration as there was at the end of the fight, when Sharkey was crowned winner. T was kept in the ring for half an hour while the crowded shouted “ Who won?” Sharkey was meeting Jim Maloney, a Boston man. the following month, and they wanted him to get the decision. “ In the States they have two judges and a referee, and their decisions are pretty fair as a rule, but there are some hot verdicts at times. The trouble is that there is such a lot of betting on matches. “ Wills’s loss to Sharkey was just about due. He is not a clean fighter by a long way. He has a habit of holding with his left while he hits with hi right, and he was cautioned about this fifteen times before being disqualified, but Sharkey would have won in any case. He is a hard man.

“ Wills was offered quite a lot of money to fight Tunney before the Tunney-Dempsey meeting was arranged, but he wouldn’t sign up. Pr bably he thought that he would get the contest with Dempsey and was not going to endanger his chances, but to me he looks finished. I think that we can * s«y that Wills is right out of the running now.

“ I think that Dempsey's idea in holding out so long without a fight was to let his contract with Jack Kearns run out and get a greater share of the takings, but Kearns signed him up with Tunney before that happened. There isn’t much question that Dempsey used Wills as an advertising medium, but that was as far as it got. “ My first fight in the United States was against * Fighting Bob ’ Lawson. He had knocked out ‘ Kid ’ Norfolk in one and a half minutes just before, and quite a few heavy-weights refused to meet him. He is coloured heavvweight champion of the L’nited States, and has a great knock-out punch I was fortunate enough to get the decision at the end of ten rounds. That was in April last year. I also met Martin Burke. Mho had fought a draw with Tunney and stopped him in eight rounds and got a draw with John Lester Johnson, the New York negro heavy-weight, whom I met in San Francisco. lie beat Dempsey seven or eight years ago, and also got a decision over Harry Wills last December at the Opening of the new Madison Square Gardens. I met King Solomon from Panama. He is a big man, and was then in the boom, but he took on too many fights, and has slipped. “In London one of my best fights was against Paolino. He is a tremendous fellow, and one of his fists would make both mine, but h 3 was wild. I beat him up rather badly, .but he was not satisfied, and so he got a return match in Paris a fortnight later, and I beat him in fifteen rc-unds.” Cook is sore at the manner of his defeat by Georges Oarpentier, and Lo possesses photographs which show the Frenchman hitting him when he is in a kneeling position, though it is not clear whether or not one knee is not off the ground.

“ I had never tasted resin until 1922, when I met Oarpentier in the Albert Hall,” he said of this. “In the fourth round he floored me, and the blow dazed me. As I was rising, I knelt, and wondered whether to get up or to hang on for a moment, as he might go at me again. Then he hit. me, and they took him to the dressing-room and came back and announced the decision. I think that, had my second jumped into the ring and claimed a foul. J would have got it, but he did not. He let the opportunity pass, and it was too late. The referee was Carpentiers own man, Jack Smith, for Oarpentier had promoted the contest. T got a pretty rough deal in that fight ”

Germany now is a good place for boxers, says Cook. Crowds of 10,000 and 12.000 attend contests, and are very enthusiastic. The German fighters are rugged, strong fellows, not very scientific, but very keen. They keep very fit, and will be hard opposition after a year or two. The contests are run on the American system of ten or twelve rounds, by which Cook thinks better fights are obtained. At the mo ment there is a good German heavyweight in the United States. His name is Deiner, and he is getting good matches. With Cook comes a young man. Bert Law, fly weight champion of Ireland, whom the Australian boxer has brought out from London. “ He lives for fighting," says Cook of the boy Law. who also fights bantamweight. He had five fights in America, and won three and drew one.