Boxing: Hope error leads to Hall fall

Mar 24 2008 South Wales Echo

MERTHYR light-middleweight Kerry Hope made a cardinal error against Manchester’s Matthew Hall and suffered a painful first defeat as a result.

Hope, a tall southpaw, decided to slug it out with a slugger and Hall, whose last two visits to Wales ended inside a round, floored him in the third and the seventh before referee Grant Wallis belatedly halted matters early in the eighth.

In the days before the fight, 26-year-old Hope, despite having stopped only one of his 11 victims, spoke of repeating the trick against Hall, having seen the stocky puncher suffer his only loss early on. It was worrying at the time; it proved disastrous in execution.

The brave Welshman possesses a sturdy chin, but seemed intent on proving it again and again, shipping a succession of solid shots in the middle rounds. Although he cut Hall in the seventh, when Kerry was decked for the second time it could – probably should – have been ended then.

As it was, a further vicious assault in the last prompted Mr Wallis’s intervention. It was a bad beating and Hope should take a long rest before returning to the ring.