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Tunisian boxing history


BoztheMadman
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For some reason, this small North African nation has produced more famous boxers than any other in this part of Africa. Tunisian fighters have been successful at world stage from before the second world war. Perhaps the first one was Victor "Young" Perez, a Jewish Tunisian flyweight who in 1931 became the world champion by knocking out Frankie Genaro in 2. He turned pro in January 1928 and fought mostly out of France. After one unsuccesful attempt, in June 1931 he became the French flyweight champion by outpointing Valentin Angelmann in 15 rounds. This fight was also an eliminator for the world title and in October he got the chance to win it against Frankie Genaro, one of the best flyweights of that time. He surprised everyone by knocking Genaro out in 2 rounds. It was Genaro's only second ko loss, the first one was to Emile Pladner. He went a whole year without defending his title but stayed busy with many fights before losing it in his first defense to Jackie Brown of Lancashire, in his home turf of Manchester, by a corner retirement after 13 rounds. He also lost the rematch to Brown which was non title fight, by decision. He also fought Panama Al Brown twice, first for the world bantamweight title in February '34, where he lost by decision, and then by KO10 in another world title fight in November that same year. He also fought Pete Sanstol and dropped a decision to him in between. He never again got a big fight and retired after 1938. Sadly, he was killed by the Nazis at the end of the war in Auschwitz, where he was forced to take part in boxing matches for their amusement.

 

Tahar Ben Hassen was a hard-hitting super featherweight who fought between 1966 and 1974. He was also the World Military Champion and fought in the 1960 and 1964 Olympics. His greatest achievement was knocking out the WBC featherweight champion Jose Legra in 4 rounds in 1971. He also halted the then-promising Briton Jimmy Revie in 2 rounds in London before that, in 1970 and also beat the experienced Ernesto Miranda by TKO 7 after that. He fought the future WBC champion Clemente Sanchez in November of 1971, just after beating Legra, but was stopped in 8 rounds by TKO. He ended his career in disappointing fashion when he was knocked out in 1 round by David Kotey, another world champion. He was almost 33 when he retired and is still alive today, aged 75. His record is 26(15)-8-3.

 

Few would have expected that the next Tunisian world champion, the first one since Perez, would be a cruiserweight. The hard-punching 6'1 Taoufik Belbouli turned pro in 1982 and in 1985 dropped a decision to Yawe Davis, which would remain his only pro loss. In 1986 he won the French heavyweight title but then vacated it to concentrate on the cruiserweight division. In 1987 he halted the former WBC champ Marvin Camel by TKO 4 and then on 25 March 1989 he became the first and so far only Tunisian cruiserweight world champion by stopping Michael Greer by TKO 8 after dominating the first 7 rounds, in a fight for the WBA title. There are conflicting reports around what then happened; according to one version, he was stripped not long after the fight and according to another, he vacated it. He then tried to reclaim it against Robert Daniels, who now held it, but the fight was scored a draw after 12 rounds. Belbouli was already almost 36 by this time and it turned out to be his last fight. His record is an impressive 29(23)-1-1.

 

Almost simultaneously, Tunisia got another world champion in super featherweight Kamel Bou-Ali. But before that happened, Ali had to go a long road. Turning pro in 1977, he lost his fifth and sixth fights, both on points, before reeling of 14 straight wins. The last one was a TKO 6 against Alfredo Layne, who would then go on to produce a massive upset victory against Wilfredo Gomez by TKO. This victory got Bou-Ali a showdown against the WBC super feather champ, Rocky Lockridge. It happened on 27 January 1985 in Italy and was a true barnburner. However, Lockridge was the better man and Bou-Ali's corner threw in the towel early in the 6th round. He then reeled off another 15 wins and then captured the WBC International title by stopping the English Robert Dickie in front of his own crowd by TKO 6. He defended it once against 21-0 Manuel Alberto Billalba by UD12. On 9 December 1989, the hard-working Tunisian finally achieved his goal when he beat Antonio Rivera of Puerto Rico for the vacant WBO title. It was a dramatic fight where Rivera was down in round 2 before putting Bou-Ali down hard in round 3 and in the end Bou-Ali put Rivera down in the 8th and the fight was stopped after Rivera just beat the count. In his first defense 20 October 1990, he faced the unheralded Pedro Villegas but the fight ended after 2 rounds when Villegas sustained a bad cut due to an accidental headbutt and the fight was declared a no contest. Bou-Ali had won both rounds on all the scorecards. He made his second and last successful defense against Joey Jacobs and easily won by TKO 3 against the overmatched Jacobs. Despite being Tunisian, Kamel Bou-Ali fought most of his career in Italy and that's where his championship tenure ended, when he dropped a split decision to Daniel Londas, a Martinique-born and French-based fighter, on 21 March 1992. He continued fighting until 1993, when he was stopped in 7 rounds by Jan Piet Bergman, in a fight for the WBC International light welterweight title. His record is 45(31)-5-3.

 

Of course, I think everybody knows that Charlie Magri is of Tunisian heritage and he was born in Tunisia as well. He won the WBC flyweight title in 1983 and was the European champion before that. Like most other Tunisian fighters, he was a never say die come forward fighter. His career ended disappointingly after he lost the WBC title in his first defense to Frank Cedeno by TKO 6 and was then stopped by Sot Chitalada in an attempt to reclaim the title by RTD 4. In his last fight, he was stopped by Duke McKenzie by RTD 5. Before that, he had reclaimed the European title and defended it once. He was and is one of the more popular British boxers and was famed for his love of partying, which earned him the nickname "Champagne Charlie". Of other boxers from Tunisia, ones worth mentioning are Naoufel Ben Rabeh, who in 2006 fought Juan Urango for the vacant IBF light welterweight title and lost on points. It turned out to be a controversial decision and it turned out that Rabeh had significantly outlanded Urango with 163 punches to 106 and even Urango's fans booed the decision. Teddy Atlas denounced it as well. It was even named one of the 20 worst decisions of the decade by The Ring. Because of that, he got another chance to win the same title against Lovemore N'Dou. Rabeh made a very good effort but faded in the late rounds and was unable to go out for the 12th and final round, thus losing by corner retirement. He was behind only by a point on all three scorecards. His last hoorah came in 2011, when he knocked out Isaac Hlatshwayo in 3. He retired in 2013, after losing on points to Jeff Horn of Australia and his record is 37(20)-4-0. He is definitely the best Tunisian boxer of the 21 century so far. Then there is Walid Smichet, a hard-punching middleweight and super middleweight who is most notable for giving John Duddy a hard fight in 2008. Smichet punished him in the first half of the fight but Duddy came back in the second and in the end his superior boxing skills gave him the nod in a majority decision. Before that, Smichet also had a close fight against Sebastien Demers but dropped a decision that was too wide. As against Duddy, Smichet was the agressor early on but appeared to run out of gas in the last half. In 2007, he knocked out the 17-0 Matt O'Brien in 10 rounds to win the Canadian interim middleweight title. Otherwise, he was stopped by Renan St.Juste in 1 round in 2006 and knocked out by Peter Manfredo jr in 7 in 2009 and then finally by David Lemieux in 2 rounds in 2010. He retired in 2014, aged 35 and has a record of 21(15)-8-3.

Edited by BoztheMadman
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