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By: Ste Rowen
Adding flames to the already burning rebirth of his career, Dave ‘The White Rhino’ Allen of Doncaster stopped former WBA ‘Regular’ titlist, Lucas Browne inside three rounds at London’s O2 Arena, with a beauty of a body shot and ensured the proclaimed ‘People’s Champion’ would be staying very much in the minds of British fans.
The ‘White Rhino’ has consistently told people that he’s a much better box than it seems, and that was the attitude he started the fight with, standing behind a steady jab with the occasional, wayward overhand thrown in. Browne, dressed in all black was much more accurate with his punches in the 2nd, mainly his right hands, punishing the home crowd favourite when given the opportunity.
A lean looking Allen was trying to time his shots for the finisher and then, in the middle of the third round, the Doncaster native landed a perfect left hook body shot that dropped the Australian, and ensured the fight was won early.
A jubilant Dave Allen, now 17-4-2 (14KOs) spoke immediately after,
‘‘I had to win, it’s all well and good telling your grandkids you headlined the O2 but when they ask ‘Did you win?’ I needed to win. But I’m greedy. I want more.
He (Browne) is a very good boxer but I knew he’d slow down. Everyone I box I beat…Mick Marsden and Darren Barker will take me as far as I can go, how far is that? I don’t know.
David Price, Dereck Chisora, who knows?…99.9% of people have fallen in love with me. I got into boxing to make my dad proud.’’
The feel-good mood was palpable as soon as Allen stepped out of the ring and considering how underwhelming the full fight card was, the ‘White Rhino’ winning, and in that fashion, seemed to make up for it.
Also on the card…
In dominant fashion, Dereck Chisora dealt with Senad Gashi with a 10-round unanimous decision, but it was a disappointing event from beginning to end. The German looked to survive rather than fight for the whole bout. Chisora followed his foe around the ring for the duration, struggling to cut Senad off and end the fight.
The bout was scheduled for 10 rounds and in not one round did it seem like the away fighter would do, literally, anything. Gashi said pre-fight that he’d visualised this fight ten times; nine times he won, one time he was disqualified but there was a serious lack of passion and fight as the bout drew on. Final scorecards were 100-90, 100-91, 99-91 all for Chisora. Gashi never looked like a threat, ‘Del-Boy’ never looked like he had the knockout blow. A disappointing co-main to say the least.
Josh Kelly scored three knockdowns en route to a whitewash victory over the previously unbeaten Przemyslaw Rusnowski. Kelly now improves his record to 9-0 (6KOs)
Lightweight, Joe Cordina claimed the British Lonsdale belt to add to his Commonwealth strap, with an impressive 6th round stoppage of Andy Townend. Cordina, now 9-0 (7KOs) dropped Townend three times before the referee called an end to the bout.
