By Emmerson Campbell
Elton Dharry recorded a crushing third round stoppage of Dexter Marques on Saturday night at the Everest Cricket Club ground, paving the way for another shot at the elusive world title.
The USA based Dharry, brought his talents back to the 592 and did not disappoint the thousands of fans which included Vice President, Bharrat Jagdeo, government ministers and other dignitaries that thronged the tastefully decorated venue.
Fighting for the spoils of the WBA Super flyweight gold title, in the headline bout of the stacked Guyana Fight Night card, Dharry showed his class and dominated from the opening bell.
Both fighters had their moments in the initial rounds, but in the third, the orthodox Dharry upped the ante, cornered Marques and unloaded a barrage of combos that rocked the latter.
A thundering right uppercut which landed as Marques was up against the ropes, sent him bleeding on the canvas as referee, Eon Jardine, instituted a mandatory count.
The badly hurt but gutsy Marques beat the count and tried valiantly to stave off the hard charging Dharry who went in for the finish. The game Marques seemed to have caught a second wind and even landed a few shots of his own but Dharry once again cornered him and floored him once again. Despite his best efforts, Marques was unable to beat Jardine’s count and the fight was waved off at 2:54s, just six seconds before the end of the round.
With the win, Dharry, 38, earned the most prestigious title of his professional 20-year career on the lawns of Everest. His record improved to 28 (16KOs)-6-1. Marques, who also lost to Dharry via the KO route in 2011, record dropped to 18-4.
Earning the WBA Gold belt, puts Dharry as a mandatory challenger for the WBA super flyweight world title.
Dharry had previously fought for the WBA world title in 2019 but suffered a controversial eighth-round stoppage against Andrew Maloney in his hometown in Melbourne, Australia.
The Brooklyn, New York based Dharry knows that Father Time is lurking and will aim to pull out all the stops to realize his dream of becoming a world champion perhaps in the last quarter of 2024.
Undercard….
The undercard featured seven bouts including the main supporting bout which saw prized fighter, 2020 Tokyo Olympian, Keevin Allicock making his professional debut in fine style.
Allicock got his punch-for-pay campaign off to an ideal start with a ‘W’, stopping his Bajan opponent, Ju-Sean Shepherd in the middle of the third round in their junior welterweight matchup.
In the other title fight of the evening, Nataly Delgado of Panama earned a head scratching unanimous decision win against Venezuelan, Johana Zuniga to earn the WBA Fedelatin super flyweight title. The scorecards read, 96-94 x2 and 97-93 for Delagado.
In arguably the most talked about fight on the card, social media sensation, Laured ‘The Lion’ Stewart decked Imran Khan three times in a one-sided, catch weight affair and went on to win via TKO in the fourth round after Khan’s corner threw in the towel. Stewart who is popular on several social media platforms like ‘Tik Tok’, was brought out to the ring by his entourage of entertainers which included reigning Soca Monarch, Carlvin Burnett.
In the most entertaining fight of the night, Jean Carlos Rodrigues of the Dominican Republic and Venezuelan, Rafael Marquez fought to a majority draw in their six-round, flyweight encounter. Fighting in a phone-booth style slugfest, both fighters had their moments and the result was fitting as the pair left it all in the sweat-soaked ring.
Other winners on the card included Edmond Declou, Ricardo Blackman and Pedro Sanchez. Declou won via unanimous decision against his Bajan opponent, Charwin Estwick in their super middleweight bout while Sanchez floored Terrence Adams just before the end of the sixth and final round to earn a TKO win.
Blackman defeated Stephan DaSilva via majority decision in their six-round bantamweight bout.
