New HW Boxers Rated

[Rocco Del Sesto]

Two more wins for Carl Gizzi bringing his record to 12-0-0,4KOs

3/19/65 Boxing News - British HW Ratings has Carl Gizzi placed 9th by himself and Rocky James 10th.

04/02/65 Boxing News - Big Tony Smith who had not fought in close to 1-1/2 years was no match for Carl Gizzi as the Welshman put Smith down in the 1st round and the bout was stopped at the end of the 1st round with Smith still on the canvas in this quick affair at the Market Hall in Carmarthen.

4/16/65 Boxing News - Carl Gizzi continued his unbeaten streak with a win over Jim Monaghan at the Liverpool Stadium when Monaghan suffered a broken nose in the 7th round and retired from the fight after being examined by his manager Johnny Campbell. It was a tough fight with both fighters battling relentlessly throughout. Monaghan had some brutal left jabs that had Gizzi reeling backwards. Gizzi showed to be more accurate with his blows from his right especially in close quarters. Monaghan's nose started to bleed in the 3rd and then a cut appeared on the bridge of his nose in the 6th. This brought Gizzi in with two-fisted combinations furthuring the damage apparenlty to Monaghan's face the he could not continue.
Also of note in the same paper, the News' British Boxing ratings now has Gizzi ranked 8th. Slowly moving up as he's much improved noted by the News in the fight account.

[Rocco Del Sesto]

Gizzi's short affair with Tony Smith was at the Carmarthen Market Hall in Carmarthenshire. Found little on this venue. Did find one photo supposedly showing the inside of part of it.

I put in the file:
Carmarthen Market Hall
Carmarthen, Carmarthenshire
Wales
Site Rating 1
Seating Capacity: 500?

[Rocco Del Sesto]

The fight between Gizzi and Monaghan was at the Liverpool Stadium. Now this was actually the 2nd venue named the Liverpool Stadium that I found out about researching. I had a Venue file in my database named Liverpool Stadium and showed a capacity of 9000. Is this a modern day Stadium that I saw a lot of websites on? An outdoor venue stadium?

So I've created files and found some photos for our 1900's Liverpool Stadium. This one in this 1965 fight....

Liverpool Stadium Two
Liverpool, England
North End Bixteth Street
Site Rating: 3
Seating Capacity: 3700. I found this noted in a website history of the Stadiums.
Liverpool Stadium was the UK's first purpose built boxing area. It opened to the public on October 20, 1932. It took 3 months to build. It was built over the site of a former graveyard at Paul's Church at the north end of Bixteth Street.

Besides boxing during the 1950s it began to hose hosted wrestling, concerts, political "hustings" and trade union meetings. On May 3, 1960 the Stadium hosted "the greatest beat show ever to be staged in Britain". It featured Gene Vincent, Davy Jones, Cass and the Cassanovas, Gerry and the Pacemakers and Rory Storm and the Hurricanes (featuringa young lad named Richard Starkey).


It closed in 1985 and was demolished in 1987.

See the website for an excellent historical article from the Liverpoolecho.co.uk

It replaced an earlier venue of the same name that was in operation from 1911 to the 1930s.

[Rocco Del Sesto]

The original Liverpool Stadium

The Liverpoolecho.co.uk has a good article on both Liverpool Stadiums.

This first Liverpool Stadium was opened in July 1911 located at Pudsey Street off London Road. The Echo article notesit as being at the time, "revered as one of the great boxing arenas of the early 20th century."

It staged bouts every Thursday night until it was demolished to make way for the London Road Odeon in the 1930s.

Liverpool Stadium One
Liverpool, England
Pudsey Street off London Road
Site Rating 3
Seating Capacity: 4000 This is noted in the Echo site.

[Rocco Del Sesto]

Was out of town on business for the week so doing some catchup being away.

Carl Gizzi continues his improving on his boxing skills to continue a slow climb in the British heavyweight rankings.

5/14/65 Boxing News - Current News British Ratings has Carl Gizzi into 8th heavyweight rank.

5/21/65 Boxing News - The matchup at the National Sporting Club between Carl Gizzi and Jamaica's Al Roye, the News called it Gizzi's "most impressive professional performance" yet compfortably outpointing Roye in the eight rounds. Roye opened the fight with a fierce attack, sending Gizzi into retreat direction. To the end of the round though, Carl started getting fast left jabs to connect halting Roye's advance attempts. Carl fought an upright defense and dictating the pace of the fight was stopping most of Roye's counter punches. In the 6th round Roye was able to connect to Gizzi's chin with a good right and then a hook to the his stomach putting Gizzi momentarily on the defense. Gizzi before the end of the 6th started connecting again with his jabs and commanded the action through the last two rounds to garner the easy points decision.

6/4/65 Boxing News - Veteran Ray Shiel, used all his experience he could muster to counter Gizzi's left jabs tp Shiel's head, but Gizzi commanded the fight pretty much from the start. Shiel did manage to draw some blood from Gizzi's nose with some of his own hard left jabbing, but it wasn't anything that slowed Gizzi. Toward the end of the 2nd, Gizzi's left jab connecting was showing its affect on Shiel's left eye. The fourth and fifth rounds were all Gizzi's as he connected solidly with rights and in the closing minit of the fight round referee Pat Floyd stopped the fight.

June 1965 Boxing Illustrated - Moved Carl Gizzi up to 7th ranked British HW for fights up through May 31, 1965.

June 1965 Ring Magazine - It's account of the Carl Gizzi v Rocky James fight won by Gizzi in an 8 round decision on 2/18/65, the Ring noted that this was Gizzi's first 8 rounder and "he proved that he is worth following for bigger honors before the 1965 year runs out."
So the first real notice Ring has of what Gizzi is doing over in the UK.

6/18/65 Boxing News - Boxing News British Rankings inch Gizzi up to 6th round British Heavyweight overtaking Shiel after his 5th rank TKO of Shield.

[Rocco Del Sesto]

Carl Gizzi is making the slow climb up the British heavyweight rankings running his record to 15-0.

7/2/65 Boxing News - Carl Gizzi and Rocky James meet for the then vacant Welsh Heavyweight Title at the National Sporting Club. Gizzi won the title, with a 5th round TKO and this 15 win without defeat as referee Harry Gibbs stopped the fight about halfway through the fifth to stop Rocky James getting any more punishment dispensed on him by Gizzi. In the first two rounds Gizzi used a sharp left jab to continually mark up points while James was missing with wild swings and Gizzi with his speed had no time avoiding. In the third round James was warned three times for low blows and then Gizzi connected with a left and then right to James' chin who lost his gum shield. The fourth, Gizzi kept landing punches punishing James and then early in the fifth Gizzi connected with a right to James' heart and that dropped him for a nine count. Gizzi continued unabated dishing out punishment on James before referee Gibbs finally saw enough and stopped it about half way through the fifth.

7/16/65 Boxing News - Has Carl Gizzi still sitting at the number 6 British heavyweight.

8/20/65 Boxing News - This is not a direct Carl Gizzi related article but he's mentioned. In what is like an editorial column in the News titles "We Say", We Say discusses how this time period in British Boxing has seen a decline in the number of professional boxer with that be most noted in the heavyweight division. A big heavyweight show to be staged in Liverpool, the editoral notes that promoters have brought in most of the top British heavyweights at the time, Brian London, Johnny Prescott, Joe Bygraves, Jack Bodell, Ray Shiel and Carl Gizzi. Billy Walker and Henry Cooper were not included in that group as Walker was slated to fight in San Remo against Eduardo Corletti and Cooper was topping a bill at Wembly in October.

[Rocco Del Sesto]

9/10/65 Boxing News - Carl Gizzi v Dave Ould was part of the 6 fight undercard schedule for the big event at Earls Court Arena, Kensington, London, the WBA/WBC World Featherweight fight between Howard Winston and Vicente Saldivar. Gizzi wins his 16th in a row with an 8 round decision over the 19-3 Dave Ould. Ould in the first couple rounds used a good left jab to keep Gizzi at a distance. Toward the end of the second Gizzi was starting to get punches to the body and he managed to open a slight cut under Ould's left eye. Gizzi dominated most in the 3rd thru the 5th rounds with hooks and jabs making thier mark on Ould. By the sixth round Ould's eye was mostly shut from the cut under it but in the sixth and seventh Ould came back to make some contact to Gizzi's head, but at the same time while leading those punches with his right he was letting lefts from Gizzi to also come in on Ould. By the last round Ould was tiring out and showed it as he did a lot of hanging on to Gizzi to finish out the fight.

10/1/65 Boxing News - Jack Whittaker who's last recorded fight was back in February 1963, a TKO loss to Jack Bodell. Whittaker came into this fight against Carl Gizzi at the Sophia Gardens Pavillion in Cardiff, as a late replacement for the scheduled Jamaican, Al Roye. Whittaker's inactivity from the ring showed as he was roughed around at will by Gizzi who put Whittaker down for a four count near the end of the second round. The referee stopped the fight at one minute and 37 seconds of the 3rd round.

[Rocco Del Sesto]

SOPHIA GARDENS PAVILION
Cardiff, Wales
Sophia Gardens off of A4119 and A4161.
No Seating capacity info found.

Located in the Sophia Gardens in Cardiff, Wales, the Pavilion was builtin 1951 for the Festival of Britain. It served as the boxing and wrestling venue for the 1958 British Empire and Commonwealth Games. This info from Wikipedia.

The building would go on also to host many concerts on through the 70's, but in January 1982 it's roof collapsed from a heavy snow. The building was demolished.

[Rocco Del Sesto]

So I was flipping through weekly Boxing News after coverage of Carl Gizzi's last fight, his 3rd round TKO of Jack Whittaker. Whittaker if you remember came out of a 2-1/2-year vacancy of the fight ring to stage a comeback as a late minute replacement opponent for Gizzi. Carl quickly took care of Whittaker. I then came across in the October 29th, 1965 Boxing News their next set of British Ratings, complete with fights up through October 26th. This ranking they show and expanded list to 15 fighters for the heavyweights instead of the normal 10 contenders under the current champion, Henry Cooper. I would never have guess this but in that number 15 slot is listed none other than Jack Whittaker!!! I saw this and then just looking at the rest of the names on the list I thought, how sorry a bad shape heavyweight boxing was in the UK at the time.

Remember I noted a bit awhile back, the New's "We Say" column writer(s) noted a decline of fighters in the UK, especially the heavyweights. Seeing these new rankings, the Boxing News would appear to be correct in that August 20th '65 assessment. They didn't have much else to pick from, so they apparently plucked Whittaker into that racking based on his previous record from 2-1/2 years previous which was 25-15-3. Not all that bad.

So that got me to wondering just who an active British (UK) heavyweight at this time. So, through a records search of BoxRec of UK heavyweight (not counting Commonwealth fighters who are not included in these British Ratings), I came up with a list of UK heavyweights who'd fought at least once in 1965 up to this October 29 Ranking. Boy! There isn't much! If you are the least bit interested in this 1965 history of British heavyweight boxing, stay tuned I'm going to go through that list and survey just who we got.

[Rocco Del Sesto]

Using the Rating menu on BoxRec and selecting all UK heavyweights I received this fairly long list, which I then searched through selecting those who fought in 1965. Might be fun to go back and rate these guys for a new batch of "tomato cans".

Starting at the bottom of the barrel of this list by how BoxRec rated these guys......

Norman Laughton, Wombwell, Yorkshire
Career Record W0(KO 0 / L2(KO 2) / D0
Those two fights and losses came in April and May of 1965 to Obe Hepburn, and Rocky Campbell. Hmm....This why you see a fair number of Commonwealth fighters coming to the UK?

Herbet Cheetham, Birmingham, West Midlands
Career Record W0(KO 0) / L2(KO 2) / D0
Cheetham's record amounted to two fights actually in September 1965 against Rudolph Vaughan and a Gary Chippendale.

Joe Johnson, London, Career Record W0(KO 0) / L2(KO 1) / D0
Almost don't count this guy. His first fight was loosing to Carl Gizzi in late October 1964. He then fought an lost to George Wiggs on January 5th, 1965 and appeared done, least according to BoxRec.

Jack Stevenson, Doncaster, Yorkshire
Career Record W1(KO 1) / L1(KO 0) / D0
Won against Bill Morgan who was 1-4-0 at the time in April 1965. Stevenson show not fights again till a single one in November 1967, which he lost a 6 round decision.

Les Daniels, Born in Londonerry, Northern Ireland, Residence in Belfast
Career Record W1(KO 0) / L3(KO 1) / D0
Lost to Gerry Hassett and Eric Fearson both seasoned fighters at least in early 1964, then in December 1964 he won by disqualification against Hassett. 5 months later in May 1965 he lost a points decision to Paddy Dempsey and he was done.

Give you an idea where this is going?!

[Rocco Del Sesto]

Next up for the dredges of UK heavyweight fighting in 1965.....

Alex Kelly, Glasgow, Scotland, Residence in Edinburgh
Career Record W4(KO 3) / L2(KO 1) / D0
Kelly, another one who really does not count having appeared before Oct 1965, but he made his debut in 1965, December 1st against a Barry Rodney , also making his debut. Kelly won. Three fights in 1966 and 2 in 1967, Kelly disappears.

Mike Morgan, Walsall, West Midlands
Career Record W1(KO 1) / L5(KO 4) / D0
Morgan shows fighting twice in late 1959, then a single fight in March 1963, then puts a "string" of fights together with 3 losses in 1965, February, March and April. two of those loses were against Billy Gray and Mick Cowan who would appear more prominent in UK heavyweights somewhat later on.

[Rocco Del Sesto]

Billy Thompson, Doagh, Northern Ireland
Career W2(KO 1) / L11 (KO 7) / D0
Started his career Oct 4, 1065, loosing 3rd round TKO to Obe Hepburn. Then lost two more in 1965 on his way to the dismissal 2-11 record.

Ian Hawkins, Hammersmith, London
Career Record W4(KO 2) / L6(KO 3) / D2
After a career starting 6 round decision against Joe Somerville (26-32-5), in March 1965, Hawkins then lost to Tony Moore (Debut, Charlie Wilson (1-2-0), Dave Barber (Debut) and Chris Cox (2-2-0) all yet in 1965.

Dane Duric, Leicester, Leicestershire
Career Record W0 / L7(KO 4) / D0
Two losses in January and February 1964 and then he does not appear again till November 1965 when he looses TKO to Len Rocky James and then again on points to Derek Groombridge in December.

Barry Rodney, Jamaica, but listed Nationality as UK.
Career Record W4(KO 2) / L14(KO 5) / D4
Not active actually till December 1965 when he debuted against Alex Kelly also making his debut. Kelly stopped Rodney in the 5th.

Mick Cowan, Rotherham, Yorkshire
Career Record W5(KO 3) / L5(KO 4) / D1
Cowan fights his first three recorded bouts in 1962 loosing his first against Jack Bodell, who was also debuting! Cowan then won two by KO. He then is not listed any fights for 3 years till he comes into the ring in early March 1965 stopping Bill Morgan in the 4th round. 3 weeks later Cowan is stopped in the 1st round by George Wiggs. Cowan next draws 8 rounds with Billy Wynter on May 5th. Cowan follows that getting KO'd in the 1st round against Ray Shiel on June 22nd. On September 20th,1965 Cowan manages an 8-round decision over Billy Wynter. Cowan will actually fight two more times in 1965, another 8 round decision win in November this time against Al Roye and then he is stopped by Carl Gizzi in December (More to here on that later).

So Mick Cowan by the October 29th issue of the Boxing News is W4(KO 2) / L3(KO 2) / D1 which is good enough to rank him 14th best British Heavyweight by the Boxing News!

[Rocco Del Sesto]

More British HW's 1965....

Brian Daltrey, Spitfields, London
Career Record W6(KO 2) / L14(KO 8) / D3
After a fairly active though mostly unsuccessful career 1961 thru 1964, Daltrey actually shows only one more fight, in very early January 1965, an 8th round TKO loss to Jack Grant. So he ended not being a factor in the ratings discussions later in the year.

Jim McIlvaney, Birth: Bellshill, Scotland, residing in Birmingham, West Midlands, Career Record W12(KO 7) / L13(KO 11) / D3
I actually rated Jim some time ago. His career actually started December 9th, 1965, so was not on the heavyweight scene yet in late October.

Chris Cox, Exeter, Devon
Career Record: W6(KO 5) / L6(KO 5) / D0
So for Mr. Cox's short career it was pretty much knock out the opponent or get knocked out! He fought twice in 1963, then does not show up again in BoxRec till Oct 4th, 1965, stopping Eric Whistler in 3 rounds. Twho other fights in 1965 he wins in 6 on points against Ian Hawkins and then is stopped in 2 round by Dave Barber. All these guys were just pretty much starting their careers. So Cox is another total non factor in the News' British rankings.

Derek Groombridge, Born Nottingham, residing in Bingham at the time.
Career Record: W10(KO 1) / L8(KO 3) / D0
I rated this chap some time ago probably 15 plus years in this forum! As I go through these heavyweights and now that I have many more resources of magazines to look through, I really want to revisit many of them. Come on retirement and give me that time!!
Groombridge career start shown is October 4th, 1965 loosing to Len Rocky James on points in 6. He fights 4 more times in 1965 winning all those fights! But another one that arrives too late in the year but mention him. As I looked through these heavyweights, late 1965 and after through the rest of the 60s and into the 70s the British heavyweight crowd did improve.

[Rocco Del Sesto]

Doug Fowler, Fleetwood, Lancashire
Career Record W7(KO 3) / L5(KO 3) / D0
Doug's record was 7-2-0 through September 1965 including consecutive wins over Ernie McCrea, Roger Woodworth, MCrea again, Lloyd Walford, Paddy Dempsey and Rocky Campbell. Only Walford and Campbell I had heard of before. Obvious why Fowler did not factor in that top 15 HW rankings in October.

Vernon Allen, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia but listed nationality as UK showing his career in the UK.
Career Record W12(KO 3) / L 23(KO 12) / D1
Another heavyweight who didn't start his career actually till November 1965 but I mention him here as another chap who shows up more prominently in the later 60s and 70s, though a punching bag for the better fighters. He is in my data Base rating listed by the TBCB3 DB Team, but I think I may have done him originally way back when. Need to look into that though. Worth revisiting.
We'll now start looking into a bit more of the meat and potatoes group of the British heavyweights in this 1965 time period.

[NightAverage]

Hey, I was wondering if anyone has a picture of Joe Cabana, a boxer who was born in Chelsea Massachusetts and who fought out of Cape Cod Massachusetts, his career spanned from 1928-1935, his most notable fights were against Jimmy Mendes in 1935, Big Boy Burlap in 1929, and Lee Anderson in 1928, his record is 17 wins, 6 of them by knockout, and 18 losses, 7 by knockout and 1 draw. I can’t for the life of me find any pictures of him and was wondering if anyone had any or knew where to find them. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

NightAverage

[Waltercito]

Originally Posted by NightAverage

Hey, I was wondering if anyone has a picture of Joe Cabana, a boxer who was born in Chelsea Massachusetts and who fought out of Cape Cod Massachusetts, his career spanned from 1928-1935, his most notable fights were against Jimmy Mendes in 1935, Big Boy Burlap in 1929, and Lee Anderson in 1928, his record is 17 wins, 6 of them by knockout, and 18 losses, 7 by knockout and 1 draw. I can’t for the life of me find any pictures of him and was wondering if anyone had any or knew where to find them. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

NightAverage

https://boxrec.com/en/box-pro/52712

I can resize it if you want the pic to be usable in the game.