Taking his cue from history, and a strong link to PR man Brian Mitchell, promoter Rodney Berman will push for title shots for professional newbies Boyd Allen (pictured, right) and Ricardo Malajika (pictured, left) after just a pair of fights.
They both recently made successful debuts at Emperors Palace and each made a big impression on the often hard-to-please Berman. “Boyd was better than expected and Ricardo lived up to the hype,” he said.
While he accepts that he might be moving with undue haste given how raw they are as professionals, he said that Mitchell’s father, Brian snr, won the SA bantamweight championship in his third bout, 62 years ago.
Recent years have seen several other South Africans land SA titles before reaching double figures in fights.
Moreover, Allen competed for many years in the MMA octagon and thus has ample combat sport experience while Malajika traded in the experience of six SA amateur titles for his pro licence.
Both will fight again on December 8 and again in February, where Berman intends lining up cracks at either the WBC’s ABU belt or the WBC’s Pan-Africa championship.
Interestingly, SA middleweight champion Wade Groth is also in the mix, with his title defence against Walter Dlamini in December also given ABU status.
Assuming he prevails, there’s a big fight down the road, likely late next year, of a bout against Allen, which is one that will doubtless thrill aficionados.
