Boxers from the Cayman Islands and the United Kingdom (UK) were involved in five of the seven bouts on the Gloves Over Guns Futures fight card last Saturday night at the Stanley Couch Gym in Parade Gardens, Kingston.

One bout had all foreign-based boxers, while only two had all Jamaican boxers. The foreigners won three of the bouts while the local boxers won four.

The vociferous audience was delighted by the boxing display, including Elise Seignolle, president of the PanAm Boxing Confederation; Chris Samuda, president of the Jamaica Olympic Association (JOA), Kevin Russell, president of the Jamaica Hotel & Tourist Association and Thelma Johill, chairman of Fern Court High School.

Perhaps the most memorable fight for the audience was the fifth bout between light heavyweights Riley Galvin of the UK and Sadeki Harris of GC Foster College (GC).

Harris quickly got to work and landed a series of punishing shots to which Galvin could not respond, forcing referee Duane Wilson to stop the fight at two minutes and 52 second in the second round.

Galvin put on a dancing display that had the crowd cheering loudly as he collected his medal.

“The fight is unique for me. I have had only two fights. It’s been two years since my last fight so I wanted to challenge myself coming to Jamaica. I am still struggling because it’s so hot in this country but it’s unreal, it’s really amazing. I have enjoyed every second of it. I don’t care about the result, what I care is I am here in Jamaica having a good time and congratulations to my opponent. It was a great fight. I had fun,” said Galvin.

The all-overseas match-up between Isaiah Hurslton of the Cayman Islands and UK’s Shahram Kalid went the distance but Hurslton won by unanimous decision.

Jolan Hobson of the Cayman Islands and his welterweight opponent Kashieve Nelson of Suga Olympic Gym looked evenly matched but that was only in body size and height as Nelson proved to be faster and stronger.

But Nelson was in punishing mood and at the end of the second round, Hobson was treated by Dr McDonald for a nose bleed at the end of round two but gave the all clear for him to continue.

Nothing changed as the punish to Hobson continued in round three as his corner threw in the towel with 10 seconds to go in the bout.

The other Cayman Islands boxer, middleweight Demar Robinson, got by the Sakima Mullings-trained Kevin Campbell of Fight For Peace’s by way of unanimous decision.

The last of the foreign-based bouts between lightweights Anthony Chaney of the UK and Joe-var Hunt of GC Foster gave the judges a challenge to determine the winner but in the end they gave it to Chaney. Both fighters punished each other in the rounds but Chaney looked to be fitter and stronger than Hunt.

The first all Jamaica match-up went to Taffarel Cayman (middleweight) of Suga Olympic Gym over Howard Robinson out of Montego Bay Gym. Robinson looked unbalanced in the ring from the start of the bout while Cayman was very aggressive. Referee Anthony McNeish stopped the fight one minute and 43 seconds in the second round as Robinson held on to the ropes to keep his balance.

The final bout of the night was the other all-Jamaica match-up (light heavyweight) which saw a disciplined Christopher Pinnock of the JDF tracking Tevoy Barrett of Suga Olympic, giving him very little room to move as he danced around the ring to prevent the power shots that were aimed his way.

With Barrett struggling, referee Kevin Stupart was forced to stop the fight at one minute and 48 seconds in the round giving Pinnock the victory.

“I put in a lot of hard work into this, not to mention my coach. My dedicated coach gave me a lot of bag drills, sprints, hard work (and) sparring. It was very hectic so I worked really hard for this fight,” said Pinnock.

Meanwhile, Seignolle, was pleased by what she saw. “I am actually vey very impressed by tonight’s fight night. The level of the kids were pretty impressive. They were novices, for some of them and you wouldn’t realize that they were novices – a lot poise, a lot of control, technically sound and at the same time a lot of heart, and I think that’s what struck me the most is so much heart from every fighter that stepped into the ring.”

Samuda felt good about his organisation’s promised $5 million investment in the sport.

“Jamaica Olympic Association is here to stay with our boxers. We see the future is bright. Let us make it even brighter but we have to be very strategic in terms of our investment in terms of investment in the human capital and the infrastructure and that is what we are pursuing,” said Samuda.