Lennox Gill has been crowned the Southern Counties champion again after a thrilling weekend of boxing.
Golden Ring ABC’s Gill, the club’s only boxer competing in the championships, had to box his semi-final against unknown quantity in Pasavali Thapa from Maidstone Gurkha ABC.
Although Thapa is a relative novice boxer he is a very experienced Mu Thai fighter and was known to be a tough nut.
Thapa came to fight but was bamboozled by Gill’s superior foot-work that kept the strong attacks from Thapa at bay who was also walking on to stiff shots from Gill, especially the back hand to the body that landed again and again and was wearing his opponent down.
This was also the Kent man’s first bout over three minute rounds and the body shots were taking their toll.
In the second Gill upped the pace a little and was boxing really well and right at the end landed a thumping back hand that forced the ref to give Thapa a standing count.
When the bell went for the third round Gill got across the ring and opened up straight away. Within 30 seconds Thapa was under immense pressure.
Gill wasn’t in the mood to let him off easily and kept on landing with solid shots to force the referee to administer another standing count before the contest was ended.
The win put Gill through to the final the following day against a former opponent Salim Muhammad from Guildford City boxing club.
Gill had won all previous meetings but all three contests had been very close.
Gill had been struggling to make 56kg weight limit but still managed to find three good rounds in the tank.
The first two were very close but the third was dominated by Gill due to his supreme fitness and strength that pushed him over the line to become the Southern Counties champion again. He will now box against the London champion.
Clubmate Martin McDonagh was drawn against another Kent boxer in Sam Dawson from St Marys ABC.
Dawson had beaten McDonagh at the same stage last season with a comfortable win for Dawson but this time McDonagh boxed superbly.
However, his coaches were left dumbfounded when a unanimous decision went against him.
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