REES AND MURRAY PRIMED FOR EUROPEAN TITLE CLASH

Posted on | June 3, 2011 | No Comments

Welshman and Irishman weigh-in ahead of Saturday’s Cardiff showdown

Gavin Rees and Andy Murray comfortably made the weight ahead of their European Lightweight title clash at the Motorpoint Arena in Cardiff tomorrow night (June 7) live on Sky Sports.

Rees, Murray and the majority of the undercard for the show weighed in at Cardiff City Hall ahead of a great Saturday Fight Night on Sky Sports for British boxing fans, starting at 10.30pm in the Welsh capital before moving over to Atlantic City in America where Carl ‘The Cobra’ Froch puts his WBC Super-Middleweight belt on the line in the Super Six semi-final, with the winner facing Andre Ward in the final later this year.

Former WBU Light-Welterweight champ Rees is gunning to become a two-weight World Champion and believes the journey starts against Murray, but Rees’ trainer, Gary Lockett, said that his man has prepared well to take on the unbeaten Irishman for the vacant strap.

“He’s good, he’s well-schooled, and his upright stance which might be a factor in how the fight goes,” said Lockett. “But we’ve got a lot of respect for Andy Murray – Gavin was an unbeaten prospect when he beat Souleymane M’baye for the WBA title when nobody expected anything of Gavin. The majority of people don’t expect Andy to beat Gavin but an unbeaten prospect like Andy is a dangerous proposition and we’ve prepared for him with that in mind.

“Gavin is in very good shape – my job has just been to slow him down a little bit. He’s a good puncher and he’s not just a reckless bull of a fighter who just charges in, he’s got good skills and good boxing ability and I’ve just had to fine tune things with Gavin, that’s all.”

The chief support on the night sees hot Belfast prospect Carl Frampton defend his Celtic Super-Bantamweight belt against Cefn Forest’s Robbie Turley – with unbeaten Frampton one of Sky Sports 11 to watch in 2011, and being guided by Irish legend Barry McGuigan.

“I firmly believe that the future of Irish boxing lies in the gloves of Carl Frampton – he is the most exciting kid I have seen in a long, long time,” said McGuigan. “He’s got the whole lot and when people get to know him they are going to love him because he’s got a great personality too.”

Tickets are available on the door at the Motorpoint Arena Cardiff on Saturday night from 6.30pm – priced £30 unreserved and £50 ringside.

Official weigh-in results

Gavin Rees (9st 8½lbs) v Andy Murray (9st 8lbs)

Robbie Turley (8st 9½lbs) v Carl Frampton (8st 10lbs)

Eamonn O’Kane (11st 8½lbs) v Dimitrijus Kalinovskis (11st)

Steve Williams (10st 2lbs) v Araik Sachbazyan (10st 1¾lbs)

Jason Cook (10st 10½lbs) v Mounir Guebbas (10st 6½lbs)

The following fights will weigh-in on Saturday:

Tony Dodson v Jamie Ambler, Frankie Borg v Costas Osben and Jeff Evans v Dean Walker.