Boxing: Action on fighters' weights

BRITISH boxing is to go weight-watching in the latest attempt to further improve its already strict medical standards. Following Spencer Oliver's ill-fated contest against Sergei Devakov, the Board of Control now intends to send officials into gymnasiums on a regular basis to monitor the poundage of all fighters.

Oliver's camp insist that the blood clot sustained by Barnet's defending champion in the European super-bantamweight title fight at the Royal Albert Hall 10 days ago could not be attributed to the demands of weight-making.

But the Board secretary, John Morris, still believes it is time to act and make certain that fighters are not short-cutting their battle with the scales, thus increasing the dangers of dehydration and with it a greater risk of brain injury.

When the Board's medical systems were overhauled after the death of Bradley Stone, the monitoring of boxers' weights was to be carried out on a random basis. The operation will now become a more concentrated one.