Wazza takes issue with Francis recent interview were he said that boxing needs to sort itself out. The miserable Khan-McCloskey under card is referred to as an example. To be fair, Wazza has a good point, he highlighted some excellent match ups this year and 2011 has been far better than 2010 - so boxing has improved imo. But, it is still good to read about Francis keeping the pressure on the promoters. Wazza can't totally cover himself in glory, as the recent PPV of Degale-Groves was not worth the money. Fair enough the German pulled out of the fight against Cleverly, but it was barely a PPV event in the first place and it certainly wasnt PPV quality after he pulled out. Perhaps, the subtle point that Francis is making (and not lost on Wazza) is that Sky will critique future PPV offerings with increasing scrutiny - well let's hope so. http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepag...**-insists-boxing-has-its-house-in-order.html Below is the link to the Barney Francis interview were he briefly talks about boxing: http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/jun/10/barney-francis-sky-sports
"With Braehmer's no show, I managed to find Tony Bellew, then when he couldn't make the weight, world ranked Aleksy Kuziemski. Prudently we had him on standby due to Braehmer's previous no shows." Then why the **** didn't you "prudently" have Bellew on stand by???atsch
That's kinda admitting that Bellew was only drafted in to get the show more publicity. Nice one Allegedly I think Francis is exactly right. It's the only sport where you can see the equivalent Manchester United vs Halifax Town and Liverpool vs Carlisle packaged as top class action. 2011 has been great so far in contrast to previous years, long may it continue.
It would be interesting to hear his views on how boxing could be sorted out. Maybe he feels the status quo is the only way to keep boxing on TV most weekends, I don't know. But then again, I'm sure most domestic champions/contenders would relish the opportunity to fight more often and be able to make a living from the sport without having to hold down a day job. A simple way would be to employ a matchmaker who can look into the records of some of the dubious foreign opposition brought over for Commonwealth title matches and reject them. I'm not a fan of the title as it's a relic of a by-gone age, but it's only particularly galling when there's a suitable domestic opponent parked up doing nothing because the ''champion'' doesn't want to fight him and can rack up some easy defences. There's some fights that Sky should force - Sykes vs Buckland, Smith vs Lindsay, some of these young HW's need putting in some sort of order too. If HBO can push promoters and fighters around despite there being a rival network I'm absolutely certain Sky can do the same and more. Of course they need to stop paying lads the best part of a million quid to turn pro. Just madness!
