Pinoys who shone in UK rings

LONDON ­– Four Filipino fighters broke the hearts of English boxing fans when they scored knockouts over hometowners in the UK and three more victimized heroes from the Kingdom in the US.

In 1997, Eric Jamili won the vacant WBO minimumweight crown via an eighth-round stoppage of Mickey Cantwell before a stunned partisan crowd at the London Arena. In 1983, unheralded Frank Cedeño halted “Champagne” Charlie Magri in the sixth round to wrest the WBC flyweight title at the Wembley Arena. Referee Angelo Poletti waved it off after Magri was decked thrice by the Talisay, Cebu, southpaw whose left hook was his most lethal weapon. In 2016, IBF flyweight champion JohnRiel Casimero blasted previously unbeaten Charlie Edwards into submission in the 10th round at the O2 Arena. In 2018, Nonito Donaire Jr. took the super WBA bantamweight title when Ryan Burnett surrendered with an injured hip in the fifth round in Glasgow, Scotland.

Pinoys who beat Englishmen in the US were Pancho Villa, Salvador (Dado) Marino and Manny Pacquiao. Villa, the first Asian world boxing king, knocked out Jimmy Wilde in the seventh round at the Polo Grounds in New York in 1923. Wilde had retired two years previously after losing to Pete Herman but was lured back into the ring with a purse equivalent to $1.25 million in today’s valuation. The Welsh “Mighty Atom” was out cold on the canvas and suffered serious memory loss to the extent that he couldn’t recognize his wife for weeks. Marino, a Hawaiian of Filipino descent, defeated Terry Allen twice on 15-round decisions in world flyweight title bouts in Honolulu in 1950 and 1951. Pacquiao flattened Ricky (The Hitman) Hatton in the second round to capture the IBO and The Ring lightwelterweight belts at the MGM Grand Garden Arena, Las Vegas, in 2009.

Two Filipinos who lost to English fighters in world title tiffs in the UK were Rolando Bohol and Donaire. Bohol was dethroned as IBF flyweight champion by Duke McKenzie in the 11th round at the Grand Hall, Wembley, in 1988. Donaire bowed to Carl Frampton on a unanimous 12-round verdict for the vacant WBO interim featherweight crown in Belfast, Northern Ireland in 2018, seven months before stopping Burnett.

Magri, now 67, saw action in four more fights after facing Cedeño, losing to Thailand’s Sot Chitalada and McKenzie to end his career in 1986. Today, he’s employed by a housing and regeneration community association as a maintenance cleaner  “The ghost of Magri’s boxing career still visits him today,” wrote Nick Parkinson in the book “A Champion’s Last Fight.” “He’s bitter about not earning more from his success.”

Magri invested in a sports shop and pub but the businesses floundered. He worked for a demolition firm and coached boxing at the school level then became a building cleaner. Magri, battling tax issues, has found it difficult to make ends meet  “It boils down to your own fault,” he said, quoted by Parkinson. “I’m not a business person. Boxers are losers, they go to the gym themselves, they run themselves and when they fight, it’s just themselves in there. They are very lonely people and it’s a hard game. I’m happy in myself but I wish I was better off and have a few quid more. I still get depression. When I won the world title, I got beat right away (by Cedeño).”