MARC McCullough says his Commonwealth Featherweight title showdown against Isaac Lowe will be the high point of his career so far.
McCullough (14-2) and Lowe (11-0-1) will meet on the undercard of the Carl Frampton-Scott Quigg world super-bantamweight title rumble at the Manchester Arena on February 27.
‘Marco’ – who began training for the fight yesterday – is confident that he can beat Lowe and add the Commonwealth strap to his Irish and WBO European featherweight titles
“It’s definitely the biggest fight of my career,” said McCullough.
“I’m looking forward to it, Lowe’s a good fighter, he’s a boxer but I think I’m a couple of levels ahead of him.
“The one hard fight he had he drew (a defence of his English featherweight title) but saying that he has looked good. I watched him last year a couple of times and he was good. It’ll be a good fight.
“He’s a nice tidy boxer, he doesn’t look like he has much power but he can switch-hit so he’ll be tricky.”
McCullough ended a challenging 2015 in style with wins against Sergio Prado (at the Waterfront Hall) and Sergejs Logins in Scotland.
“Everythings been going well,” he said.
“I’ve been ticking over – I took a couple of days off over Christmas but I’ve kept the weight down.
“Fergal McCrory (his stablemate at Breen;s Gym) is fighting on the show at the Europa in February so I’ll do a few rounds this week with him to start off and then bring in a couple of sparring partners from England next week or the week after.
“We’re already looking at people we can bring over so I’m looking forward to that too. In the six-eight weeks coming up to a fight I really do push myself and I think bringing in different sparring partners – rather than just sparring the same ones – gets you ready for anything that comes up in the fight.
“We’ve got sponsorship now with Traynors Motorstore so we can bring in the right people.”
McCullough has been involved in some thrill-a-minute tear-ups during his career but he displayed a more measured, patient approach against Prado at the Waterfront Hall in a fight that went the distance.
“People were saying ‘you should have finished it off’ but I was just glad to get the 10 rounds because I had only had three rounds last year,” he said.
“I was glad to get the rounds in so I know in my own head I can still do 10 rounds.”
The back-to-back wins also got his first round knockout loss to Zoltan Kovacs out of McCullough’s system once and for all.
“If I had been out-boxed I would have took it a lot harder,” said the Shankill Road fighter.
“But I took that fight at the last minute and I did too many things wrong. Since that I’ve brought in a nutritionist and I’ve learned a lot from the defeat. I’m trying to improve every time.”
Also confirmed on the bill at the Manchester Arena are Luke Wilton, Olympic champion Luke Campbell and British bantamweight titlist Ryan Burnett while Conrad Cummings is also understood to be featuring.
Flyweight Wilton (16-4-1) takes on English champion Charlie Edwards (6-0) in an eliminator for the British title
THE undercard for the ‘Elimination’ fight night at the Europa Hotel on Saturday, February 6 is full of top Irish prospects.
MHD Promotions, in association with A McLean Bookmakers, have put together another action-paced bill headlined by James ‘The Future’ Fryers’ showdown against Daniel ‘Maxi’ Hughes in a 10-round eliminator for the British super-featherweight title,
The exciting and charismatic 2012 Commonwealth Games silver medallist Joe ‘The Dragon’ Fitzpatrick who is now undefeated in three contests (all wins by knockout) has a test of his own that has all the hallmarks of a shoot-out when he takes on the heavy-handed Latvian Ruslans Berdimuradovs (8-5) seven of his own wins coming by KO.
Berdimuradovs bounced back from a defeat at the hands of James Fryers in November in Estonia to win a local prizefighter competition in Riga in December.
“Joe is becoming very hard to match so he is stepping up earlier than anticipated but he’ll show his class on the night,” said promoter Mark Dunlop.
Meanwhile, talented Coalisland prospect Fergal McCrory has his second fight also on the bill.
McCrory steps up considerably from his debut at the Waterfront Hall when he takes on the very durable Hungarian Peter Mellar (4-20-2).
Mellar has only four stoppage losses on his card and has taken many prospects and contenders the distance including Sergio Prado, the former EU champion who gave Marco McCullough a great fight in November.
“When Mark asked me was I interested in this fight for Fergal I was delighted. We said yes straight away,” said John Breen
“He was disappointed after his debut that his travelling fans only seen a minute of action, this will be a barnstormer.”
James Tennyson warms up for his looming British featherweight title challenge in a six-round contest, Paul Hyland jnr is also down for six rounds and Tyrone McCullough has his long awaited home debut on the six-fight card.
Tickets are priced at £75 VIP Ringside (including a four course meal) £45 (ringside) and £35 (unreserved). For tickets call 07712 473905.
TYSON Fury’s rematch with Wladimir Klitschko won’t be in Croke Park.
There had been rumours that Fury’s promoter Mick Hennessy was considering staging the heavyweight blockbuster at the home of the GAA but Hennessy confirmed yesterday that the Jones’ Road venue isn’t an option.
“There was some talk of it, Tyson would love the fight to be there but it’s whether the fight could do the numbers basically,” Hennessey told The Irish News yesterday.
“It’s not in the running, we had looked at it but it’s just not adding up. We’re looking at different venues all over the place, we’re even looking at the United Arab Emirates and it’ll end up where it makes sense commercially.
“There’s a hell of a lot to take into consideration with the stadium – the numbers, the crowd and what the costs are. It’s hard, Tyson would love to fight in Croke Park but commercially it looks like it will be somewhere else.”
Hennessy didn’t rule out staging a fight at ‘Headquarters’ in the future, adding that a showdown between Fury and a British opponent could “potentially” go to Dublin.
“I would love it to be there, it would be fantastic,” he said.
“Hopefully everyone would come out for him, I’d like to think that the nation would get behind him.”
