Boxing: Ampofo bows out after failure to win world title
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Your support makes all the difference.Francis Ampofo has decided that it is time to retire from boxing 11 years after he first won the British flyweight title and just a few hours after failing for the fourth time to win a world title at the Brentwood Centre on Saturday night.
Ampofo is barely five feet tall and during his 12-year career he fought 28 times and only once, in his 1994 attempt to beat South Africa's Jake Matlala, did he have a height advantage. On Saturday night he conceded about five inches and lost for the third time to Johnny Armour in yet another challenge for the World Boxing Union's bantamweight title.
"I honestly believed that I had enough left to win but I know now that it is time to walk away and stop fighting," admitted Ampofo in his changing room after the bout.
In 1991 Ampofo won the British flyweight title when his fists and his head cut Welsh idol Robbie Regan sufficiently to terminate their fight in Cardiff. Ampofo won a truly brutal fight in round 11 because of the cuts but he was close to victory in any case.
A few months later Regan outpointed Ampofo to take the title back and when the Welshman vacated, Ampofo won the British title for the second time in 1992. He added the Commonwealth title and made one defence before losing the Commonwealth title in the ring and the British title on the scales.
In 1997, 1999 and 2000 he lost fights on points for the British and Commonwealth bantamweight titles, and also in 2000 he lost the first of his fantastic trilogy with Armour. Their rematch earlier this year ended in a scandalous decision in Armour's favour but there was no disputing the latest verdict and no objections to Ampofo's decision, at 35, to retire.
On the undercard, Liverpool's Colin Dunne retained his World Boxing Union lightweight title for the seventh time with a hard-fought points win over Esteban Morales of Colombia. The champion took his record to 38 wins and one defeat.
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