Craig Richards defeated Dan Azeez with a dramatic knockout victory in the 12th round of their light-heavyweight contest in Ghana.
In a historic moment for Matchroom Boxing, where they hosted a show in Africa for the very first time, an evenly-matched contest topped the bill at the University of Ghana Sports Stadium in Accra.
The two south Londoners, who live five minutes apart in the capital, put on a classic 12-round bout that was ended at the death with a rasping left hook from Richards, which slept his compatriot.
Azeez seemed to be having the better of the early exchanges, bopping and weaving in and out of range, looking to ruffle Richards’ feathers on the inside.
However as the rounds wore on, Richards’ second wind kicked in, and he found his slick rhythm, able to time ‘Super Dan’ on his way in with the right uppercut.
Azeez continued to tire and was already on unsteady legs when he was stopped, but this is a statement victory for the 35-year-old Richards, who moves to 20-4-1 in his professional record.
“Big thanks to Dan Azeez,” Richards said afterwards.
“A lot of these light-heavyweights have been dodging me, but Dan stepped up. A true warrior who gave me a good fight tonight.
“I knew he was fit and strong and he’d give me a rough time for the first few parts of the fight. I just tried to show my patience and experience tonight.
“I waited down the line a little bit. I’m not saying that I’m that level, but I watched [Terence] Crawford-Shawn Porter, and tried to copy a bit of that.”
Elsewhere on the card, there was a slugfest between two home favourites - Jonathan Tetteh and ‘Freezy MacBones’ - with Tetteh just scraping victory after a wild bite from MacBones that saw him deducted a crucial point late on.
