Tony Jefferies quits UK for America
Beijing Olympic bronze medallist Tony Jefferies has become the latest boxer to quit England and head across the Atlantic to America.
The Sunderland-born light-heavyweight has teamed up with Tommy Brooks in order to progress his career, following an unbeaten start.
“Jaffa” was one of the promising young batch of fighters to go out to China as part of the Great Britain team in 2008 and came away with a third-place medal. Since then he turned pro signing with Frank Maloney and has racked up a career of seven fights six wins and a draw.
Things were going well for Jefferies until his last fight when a bizarre mix-up saw the Mackem and his team claiming they were expecting the fight with Polish journeyman Michael Banbula to be scheduled for six rounds instead of eight.
It was a very strange incident which did actually see Jefferies walk over to the referee at the end of the sixth looking for confirmation of the winner. Still he would have come away knowing he didn’t box well and should have had the skill to blast Banbula out with relative ease regardless of the rounds.
That fight did for Jaffa’s coach and former Ricky Hatton assistant trainer Bobby Rimmer, who parted ways late last month and now Jefferies looks towards Brooks as his future.
Maloney said on his website: “I have no doubt that Tony has made the right choice.
“Tommy isn’t just a coach, but also a teacher and that is exactly what Tony needs to help him develop. I have seen Tommy work with fighters and he is one of the best trainers in the world.”
“When Lennox was looking for a trainer I put Tommy’s name up and he was interviewed, but the feeling among some of the team was that he was too inexperienced at the time.”
Brooks certainly has pedigree with top-level fighters, working with Evander Holyfield for the majority of his career and at one time or another having Yuri Foreman, Junior Jones, Vitali and Wladimir Klitschko, Mike McCallum, Hasim Rahman, Mike Tyson and Pernell Whitaker under his tutelage.
“I am looking forward to working with Tony and I am sure that given time with each other we will form a good team and I can get the best out of him,” Brooks said.
“From our conversations it is clear he is willing to learn and there is plenty to work with.”
With the likes of James DeGale, Billy Joe Saunders and David Price excelling since Beijing, Jeffers doesn’t want to fall behind, especially as he competes in the fiercely competitive 12 and a half stone division.
If there is one thing Brooks knows though its light-heavy’s as Holyfield testifies. He will certainly be able to show whether or not Jefferies is the “Real Deal” as a future title contender.
Tags: