NICK AIMS TO HAVE A BALL ON HOME SOIL ONCE AGAIN AGAINST FORMER WORLD CHAMP
Nick Ball makes his second consecutive defence of his WBA World Featherweight Title on home soil this weekend as he faces former world champion TJ Doheny in Liverpool.
After a controversial draw against Rey Vargas for the WBC crown just over a year ago, Everton Red Triangle’s Ball picked up the WBA title in a closely contested affair against the American Ray Ford in June and then made a successful first defence of the title against the American Ronny Rios back in October.
Here, though, he faces off against one of, if not the, toughest tests of his career against the hard-hitting former world champion TJ Doheny.
At 26-5, all of the Irishman’s defeats have come at the highest level against the likes of Sam Goodman, Mick Conlan and, most recently, the monster himself, Naoya Inoue.
He claimed the IBF Super-Bantamweight Title back in 2018 and, despite suffering five losses in 11 fights since that victory over Ryosuke Iwasa, he’s shown more than enough to suggest that, despite nearing 40, he’s still got plenty left in the tank.
As a contest, it’s a really intriguing match-up.
Ball, as usual, will be all action. He’s going to look to outwork the older man and target the body as often as he can to slow those southpaw feet down.
However, Doheny can punch—really punch—and there’s a fair argument that he’s the biggest puncher Ball has faced to date.
If he can walk Ball onto something big from that tricky southpaw stance early on, it could make for a really interesting fight.
You’d expect Ball to come out the victor, but with Doheny well and truly having an Indian summer in his career, do not be surprised if we see an upset.
The undercard prior to the main event is well and truly STACKED.
In the chief support, the hard-hitting Andrew Cain takes on another former world champion in Charlie Edwards.
Cain suffered a narrow split-decision defeat to Ionut Baluta back in 2023, but since then, he’s returned to his old ways with a hat-trick of stoppage victories, including a fifth-round stoppage of Ashley Lane for the British & Commonwealth Bantamweight Titles last July.
Edwards, meanwhile, has had activity to blame for his lack of progression.
His only career defeat to date came back in 2016 against John Riel Casimero, and since that night, he’s gone undefeated and picked up the WBC World Flyweight Title in the process.
He has, however, fought just five times in nearly six years, but now, being trained by Stephen Smith, he’ll be looking to take one step closer to becoming a two-time world champion.
This fight is a classic case of boxer vs brawler. Edwards is probably the more naturally talented of the two, but Cain’s grit, determination and power are something to admire.
He’ll be all over Edwards from the first bell, but if the brother of former IBF world champion Sunny Edwards can weather the early storm and take this fight deep, he’s got a great chance of claiming the win.
Whether he can do that or not is another question.
Onto the remainder of the card now, and Bradley Strand—another one of Nick Ball’s ERT teammates—will be hoping to continue his comeback from the first loss of his career against the Romanian bogeyman himself, Ionut Baluta.
Strand was faultless in his 10-fight career prior to his defeat to Dennis McCann, but he bounced back in style with a convincing victory over Marvin Solano last time out.
Baluta is highly regarded as one of the unsung heroes of British boxing.
He’s boxed out of the UK since 2019 and has picked up shock victories over two fighters on the card—TJ Doheny and Andrew Cain.
This is a man who is relentless, and he won’t give Strand a moment to breathe, so if the Scouser isn’t on it, he could well be another name added to Baluta’s list of upsets.
The undefeated, heavy-handed Jack Turner puts his 0 on the line in a cracking Liverpool derby against Ryan Farrag.
At 10-0 with nine stoppages, including eight of those coming in the first round, the 23-year-old Turner has built himself up a reputation as one of the biggest prospects in British boxing.
The much more experienced Farrag may be 23-5, but all of his losses have come at a high level.
He picked up the Commonwealth title in June of last year, and this has crossroads fight written all over it.
The pair have exchanged words on social media in the build-up too, so there’s a lot of needle already, even before a punch has been thrown.
On the rest of the card, 22-year-old world-ranked Cuban lightweight prospect Jadier Herrera will be hoping to take another step closer to a world title shot against Jose Maciaz Enriquez, with Jack Power and Stephen Clarke both hoping to add to their unbeaten starts in the paid ranks.
There are also debuts for talented amateurs Leighton Birchall, William Birchall, Lewis Lawton and Joe Bourne on an action-packed night of boxing on Albert Dock.