Brandon “Fast Guns” Thysse is the breakout story of South African boxing. Entering the 4@War junior middleweight tournament as an underdog, he kept proving the experts wrong. First, he stopped Roarke Knapp in seven rounds. Then he steamrolled Boyd Allen in three rounds in the final, capturing the WBA Pan African and IBO All-Africa belts and avenging a previous decision loss to Allen in the process.
Thysse has shown remarkable improvement under trainer, Damien Durandt and it did not go unnoticed by promoter, Rodney Berman, who has signed Thysse to a contract, making him officially a Golden Gloves fighter. “In fairness to him, he has beaten two quality opponents and he has beaten them convincingly. We had a very meaningful discussion with Damien this morning and he has now come on board. Unfortunately, I cannot give him his first domestic fight until our June tournament, but having said that we had talks with Nisse Sauerland, who just signed Chris Eubank jr. It is important for me to get Brandon going and not having him waiting around. The plan is to keep him busy on the undercard of Eubank’s first fight with Sauerland, although it will probably be a stay busy fight.”
“I am not detracting from our other junior middleweights,” Berman adds. “I’ve got big plans for Roarke Knapp and have also not forgotten about Boyd Allen who is also very much still in our plans down the line.” Knapp has rebounded well with two impressive stoppage wins over Tristan Truter and Simon Dladla, but a Thysse rematch is not on the cards for now. “They can go their separate ways,” says Berman.
Then there is also the question of how to keep the up-and-comers busy. At the start of the lockdown, Golden Gloves was planning a series of development tournaments but with the financial and other constraints that the pandemic caused, plans had to be changed. “Our original plan just proved impossible with the eco-isolation required for all the fighters. We are going to open the show at around five in the evening on March and put on four four-rounders and then do the same again in June,” explains Berman.
