BoxRec

always had good times to be honest, long may it continue

You can't go to as many shows as I have and not have the odd bad experience.

Perhaps the worst was trying to convince the cretinous security guards at the MEN that I was a member of her majesty's press.

"Where's your press pass?"
"Er, I have to pick it up from there." (Point behind said moron to where there is a ticket booth with a massive sign saying 'Press passes' over it.)
"You have to have a pass to get in."
"Yes, I understand that. All you are doing is allowing me into the foyer where I can then pick up my pass to go and see the boxing."
"You need a pass."
"Yes. My pass is at the desk behind you."
"You need a pass to get in."

I've been to a couple of shows where there have been riots. The safest place at a Darlington show once was in the fecking ring - no joke.

The most irritated I've been actually was at another Darlington show. Lee McAllister boxed. His fans were utter and complete wankers looking for bother.

yer some security guards can be quite a nuisance

Went to Hatton v Maussa in Sheffield back in 2005 with my girlfriend(who is hispanic by the way) and was unfortunate enough to be seated near a bunch of chavs shouting "go on Ricky lad, kill the f*cking "spic" bastard!" which as you can imagine my lady wasn't particularly thrilled about.

Can safely say it put me off the "major" fights with massive crowds where a large amount of the crowd haven't got a clue what they are watching or what is on the line, so I have stuck to the small hall stuff where the crowds are smaller so therefore less chance of ignorant morons ruining it for you.

banjo wrote:Went to Hatton v Maussa in Sheffield back in 2005 with my girlfriend(who is hispanic by the way) and was unfortunate enough to be seated near a bunch of chavs shouting "go on Ricky lad, kill the f*cking "spic" bastard!" which as you can imagine my lady wasn't particularly thrilled about.

Can safely say it put me off the "major" fights with massive crowds where a large amount of the crowd haven't got a clue what they are watching or what is on the line, so I have stuck to the small hall stuff where the crowds are smaller so therefore less chance of ignorant morons ruining it for you.

yer know what u mean about the bigger shows, small halls tend to have the more knowledgble fans attending

I went to the Bruno vs Bugner fight myself,never been so scared in my life,load of skinheads let off tear gas right next to me on the stands,could hardly breathe or see and then had to get the tube to victoria station at midnight

Ive been to quite a lot of shows in the past, Been to see George Foreman in london, very relaxed atmos. Even the Eubank fights ive been to have all been great, especially the one again Wharton. Went to see Naseem v/s Ingle and that was also a great show.

Never had a bad experiance, but, i remember going to see Scarborough v/s Doncaster Rovers (footy, new years day a few years back) and it was kicking off all over the place, Donny fans storming the pitch and there was a tug of war with the rope being a donny fan, cops and stewards on the pitch side and donny fans on the stand side. We left 10 minutes before the end as we had to walk through a rough part of Scarborough to get to my car.

BIGMARK wrote:

bigjack wrote:I went to the Bruno vs Bugner fight myself,never been so scared in my life,load of skinheads let off tear gas right next to me on the stands,could hardly breathe or see and then had to get the tube to victoria station at midnight

it was quite a nasty night and near bombfire nite so alot of fireworks were going off in the stands. Mark Kaylor was fighting on the undercard and i think his fans were having a bit of a tear up with a few rivals as there was more fighting in the stands during his bout than in the ring.

did that tear gas effect Nigel Benn. i seem to remember he was on the undercard.

That was a cold but good night of Boxing, Tony Laing winning his Comm title, and it being after the Bruno Bugner fight, it was never televised!! and Gary Mason bashing but not knocking out, Andy Gerrard,,, My mates from spandau Ballet were there as well, great night,
it was the last promotion with Barry Hearn and Duff-Lawless,
after sorting out the 3 way split between Barry, duff and lawless, duff-lawless said what about Jarvis astaires split, As Jarvis was part of Duff-Lawless, Barry said, you can give him out of your split!!, lol so much fun in them days

Ian 'Mr' McNeilly wrote:
I've been to a couple of shows where there have been riots. The safest place at a Darlington show once was in the fecking ring - no joke.

Oh I wondered who that was trying to clamber between the ropes. You nearly caught a right hook of Francis Jones....

"her Majesty's press"......I shall have to try that one at the Box Office sometime, I'll take a spare tuxedo...

I don't recall Mcallister's lot being bothersome when he schooled John Paul Ryan, but I think I was other side of the ring so I will bow to your knowledge on that one. I tipped the feather-fisted Scot to do John Murray on the back of that solitary 5 year old performance lol ....mind it was working til he got stopped.

well I seemed to have a good seat, as I started to film Barrys shows by then, so they wer comps,
The Benn fight where the cs gas was let off was at the bingley hall for the Tony Sibson fight,

ERIC GUY wrote:well I seemed to have a good seat, as I started to film Barrys shows by then, so they wer comps,
The Benn fight where the cs gas was let off was at the bingley hall for the Tony Sibson fight,

was that Sibbo v/s Hagler

bigjack wrote:I went to the Bruno vs Bugner fight myself,never been so scared in my life,load of skinheads let off tear gas right next to me on the stands,could hardly breathe or see and then had to get the tube to victoria station at midnight

i was way up in the terraces for Bruno - Bugner...the only one in the whole stadium with a yellow Bugner cap on !

im not scared of anything

Worst experience for me was post fight for Hatton v Pendleton, thousands of smashed manc hoolies leering at eachother and spoiling for a fight, then spilling into the street where they started kicking lumps out of eachother, fornicating mental.

A bad one for me was at the NEC when the McCracken v Foster fight was on the undercard of Benn Giminez. Full scale riot that night with the Man united and Birmingham fans trying to kill one another.

onmce had to go for a shit at the MEN.
terrible. DD

NorthEastBoxingFan wrote:

Ian 'Mr' McNeilly wrote:
I've been to a couple of shows where there have been riots. The safest place at a Darlington show once was in the fecking ring - no joke.

Oh I wondered who that was trying to clamber between the ropes. You nearly caught a right hook of Francis Jones....

Aye, I did climb up on the ring apron, no joke. Jones-Moir was an absolute cracker until those idiotic townie dements went wild.

jonny wrote:A bad one for me was at the NEC when the McCracken v Foster fight was on the undercard of Benn Giminez. Full scale riot that night with the Man united and Birmingham fans trying to kill one another.

Yeah that was a bad night, I was filming from a scaffold built for the tv, but they did not use that position, so I managed to get that place to film the Boxing from..Mike Goodall the MC told them to stop as they are being filmed, and the police would be looking at the footage, , POINTING AT ME!!!, bloody idiot, lucky they ignored him, otherwise I would have been killed,
The sibsom fight was against Frank Tate I think, not hagler as that was in he states,
Another bad 1 I was at was in Paris, Derek Williams against J M Chanet, The was an absolute riot, Lennos sent me there to film it as he was gonna fight the winner, and about the 11th round chairs went flying etc, people fighting, if you ever look at the video 'Boxing Gone Crazy' which I helped with, you can see it on there, and I am in the middle of the ring filming all the outer ring action!!!

Another 1 was the junior aba finals in bridlington, 2003 0r 2004, that was a mini riot at an am show,

Went the MEN a few years back to watch Hatton v Vince Phillips with a few mates one of who was mixed race (black), got tickets via a lad who was on the undercard. After a few of the undercard fights went the bar to come back to our seats which were now occupied by a gang of fellas (actually friends & family of the lad who we had got tickets off). I proceeded to gain access to my seat and asked the fella in my seat to move & was met with stern resistance, so i compromised and asked where he was sittin & i'd sit in his seat as it didn't bother me as long as we got to see the fight. So we went off to their seats amongst sneers by the gang, then one brave fella piped up & shouted while our backs were turned "go on f uck off and take that n$gger with you!" .......... a scuffle broke out and we were taken away by security.

Felt very let down as we had given our support to the lad on the undercard, just a shame his crew let him down!

Bad experience

I went to a bill at the Guildhall in Preston. Anthony Farnell vs some Russian dude and Bobby Vanzie vs Yuri Romanov were the main events. David Barnes, Michael Gomez, Michael Jennings and Wayne Alexander were on the undercard and Derry Matthews and Andy Morris made their pro debuts that night as well. Anyway, right in the middle of the Vanzie-Romanov fight, a series of fights broke out all over the place between ,as far as I could tell, Jennings fans and another boxers fans. I remember while the boxers were still fighting, the MC/timekeeper(that old geezer - who sets up rings Duffield is it?) shouting via the ringside microphone over the PA "STAY IN YOUR SEATS AND BEHAVE!"

Just thought that was terrible whilst an actual fight in the ring was going on. Some people have no respect. I'll always remember a few things about that night:

1. My mate coming out the toilets shouting "Hey! I just took a piss next to GLEN MCCRORY!!"
2. A bunch of Derry Matthews fans from Liverpool looking at me and saying "He looks like a boxer...he maybe fighting our Derry..."
3. The fights outside the ring.
4. Bobby Vanzie getting knocked down fivetimes.
5. Thinking "why the eff are so many people wearing sombreros?" (Later found out they were Gomez fans).

Good times....

JCB123 wrote:Went the MEN a few years back to watch Hatton v Vince Phillips with a few mates one of who was mixed race (black), got tickets via a lad who was on the undercard. After a few of the undercard fights went the bar to come back to our seats which were now occupied by a gang of fellas (actually friends & family of the lad who we had got tickets off). I proceeded to gain access to my seat and asked the fella in my seat to move & was met with stern resistance, so i compromised and asked where he was sittin & i'd sit in his seat as it didn't bother me as long as we got to see the fight. So we went off to their seats amongst sneers by the gang, then one brave fella piped up & shouted while our backs were turned "go on f uck off and take that n$gger with you!" .......... a scuffle broke out and we were taken away by security.

Felt very let down as we had given our support to the lad on the undercard, just a shame his crew let him down!

Bad experience

Yes, sadly there seemed to be endemic racism at the MEN. In the queue for a taxi to the venue, there was a japanese couple who didn't have a clue what they were doing, there was a big queue at the taxi rank, and they didn't seem to understand you were meant to queue up (people don't really queue in Japan, I've been there, it's mad). Immediately two young manc chavs bowl over to them and start leering at them, and then advise them, "Get to the back of the fornicating queue or I'll dropkick you, you pakki cnts"

Inside the Arena, there were a lot of people screaming (though a small minority), 'Go on ricky, kill the black bastard.'

I've not been to boxing at the MEN since, really didn't like the atmosphere one bit. The fight itself was great, and Hattons entrance was electric, but the aftermath was pretty sickening.

I've got a lot of mates from up north, and I understand now why they think that southerners are soft, there's just so much more random drunken violence. Most of them said they would be in fights pretty much every weekend out on the town, whether they wanted to or not.

ERIC GUY wrote:
.Mike Goodall the MC told them to stop as they are being filmed, and the police would be looking at the footage, , POINTING AT ME!!!, bloody idiot, lucky they ignored him, otherwise I would have been killed,

ERIC GUY wrote:Another 1 was the junior aba finals in bridlington, 2003 0r 2004, that was a mini riot at an am show,

Eric, was it you I was sitting behind at Wembley Conference centre, I think it was Michael Ayers last fight - there was this geezer who was getting done over by about 20 people, think he actually started it, and I remember there were a camera crew there and they were playing back film of the crowd fight, which was the cause of much laughter amongst the press row. The guy was staggering around trying to fight people whilst getting kicked from pillar to post.

banjo wrote:Went to Hatton v Maussa in Sheffield back in 2005 with my girlfriend(who is hispanic by the way) and was unfortunate enough to be seated near a bunch of chavs shouting "go on Ricky lad, kill the f*cking "spic" bastard!" which as you can imagine my lady wasn't particularly thrilled about.

For some reason, the Mancunian boxers often seem to attract the, ahem, less enlightened members of society. In the worst examples, Brodie v Chi and Farnell v Takaloo did not exactly feel like meetings between the Equal Opportunities Commission and Political Correctness Brigade, put it that way. I know the boxers themselves are by all accounts very decent fellas, but I just wonder why they have these fans, and is it a Manchester thing.