“SCOTT OCCUPIES A COT OF HONOUR.”

Star (Christchurch), Issue 19197, 10 October 1930, Page 9

“SCOTT OCCUPIES A COT OF HONOUR.”

AMUSING REVIEW OF RECENT BOXING BOUT.

Mr W. O. M'Geehan, the foremost boxing authority in America, writes as follows in the “New York Tribune" on the recent Scott-Stribling match in London:— « “At any rate, Mr Phil Scott, the British champion, more fouled agaipst than fouling, has gone horizontal for the last time. All the king’s horses and all the king’s men cannot get Philip up again. “From now on he occupies a cot of honour beside Bombardier Wells and Joe Beckett. This time it was young Mr Stribling, the acrobat of Macon Galveston, who put Scott into his most comfortable pose with a series of blows that, were all above the equator. “This brings up the status of Stribling—if any—in regard to the heavyweight championship.

“After all, the achievement o£ making Scott look natural does not seem to give Stribling much claim to anything, I seem to recall that Air Scott, on his first visit to this country, was knocked into normalcy by one Knute Hansen. All Fair Blows. “All the blows used were fair. In fact, most of them were delivered above the neck. “With the customers of the cauliflower industry in this part of the country Mr Stribling has been about as popular as a polecat at a lawn party. It may be that young Mr Stribling could fight, but he never showed any symptoms of it in this vicinity. “In The Battie of What of It at Miami Beach, where he waltzed for ten rounds with Jack Sharkey, most of the New York customers went to sleep, and they protested that it was too high a price for a night's rest. If William is a fighter, he always travelled through New York disguised. “By Right of seniority, as I understand it, Bombardier Wells is honorary president of the Horizontal Heavyweights Club, of which Beckett is vicepresident. Phil Scott, in spite of any prominence he may have attained socially or otherwise on either side of the Atlantic, will be admitted with the status of junior member.’*

Rowing Tragedy. Two of the crew of four of the Talkin Tarn (Cumberland) Amateur Rowing Club, who were competing at the Middlesbrough regatta on the River Tees on June 2S, were drowned when their craft capsized in the sight of hundreds of spectators. Many women fainted at the suddenness of the tragedy. The victims were S. Robinson and Ernest Black, both young men of Brampton, Cumberland. The boat, as a result of the choppy condition of the river, had shipped a good deal of water, and was about a hundred yards from the winning post when it overturned. The oarsmen were completely exhausted by their strenuous race, in which they had taken part against Bede College (Durham) Amateur Rowing Club. A Paralysing Blow.

The strange thing about the solar plexus punch is that while it deadens the body, it makes more active the mind. Trevor C. Wignall. in relating his long experience of the National Sporting Club, tells of the blow with which Georges Carpentier knocked Bombardier Wells out in one second in 1913. The blow that toppled him over was a solar-plexus punch, and when he dropped he was perfectly conscious. His wits were also functioning throughout the ten-seconds count: functioning so well, indeed, that he heard distinctly the shouts of the timekeeper and the calls of his own • ttendants. But his limbs were paralysed, as were Jim Corbett's when he was \ knocked otit with a similar punch by Bob Fitzsimmons. “The thing I remember best,” Wells once said, “was •that when I hit the canvas I found myself looking straight into the face of Danny Maher, the jockey'. ITis head was slightly bowed, and his feaI tures were anguished. 1 tried to get 1 up, but I simply couldn’t move. Mv' brain was all right, but my legs and arms were powerless.”