Sam Eggington breathed life back into his career as he handed out a two-round beating to Orlando Fiordigiglio in Florence, Italy, on Thursday night.
The 35-year-old Italian went into the fight ranked No 5 by the IBF at super-welterweight, as well as holding rankings of 15 with the WBC and 14 with the WBO, but could not cope with Eggington’s walk-forward aggressive style.
The Englishman had a good first round but started finding the target with his right early in the second and, with a minute left in the round, two hard rights rocked Fiordigiglio in his own corner. The Italian tried to hold, but did a pretty poor job of it as Eggington continued to land with his free right hand, sending Fiordigiglio falling back to the ropes, before Ammar Sakaroui, the French referee, dived in to rescue him with 47 seconds left in the round.
The win handed Eggington the IBF International belt, but more importantly it put his career back on track after a difficult two years for the 25-year-old.
Back in 2017 he was on a roll, after wins over Paulie Malignaggi and Frankie Gavin, as well a knockout of Ceferino Rodriguez to claim the European welterweight title.
But he lost that title to Mohamed Mimoune, a defeat that was followed by comprehensive stoppage losses to Hassam Mwakinyo and Liam Smith, who completely outclassed him.
There was more away success as Luther Clay, the South African based in Berkshire, England, won a wide unanimous ten-round points decision over Dario Morello.
Morello, from Cetraro, in the south of Italy, came in with a 15-fight unbeaten record but was knocked down in the fifth and seventh rounds, as Clay consistently beat him to the punch and was a 98-90 winner on all three scorecards.
The event was the sixth Matchroom show in Italy and continued a theme of British boxers beating Italian hopefuls.
Tonight’s two British wins followed Matchroom’s previous Italian show in July in Rome when Marcus Morrison, the middleweight from Manchester, knocked out former WBA title challenger Emanuele Blandamura, while on the same bill Tommy McCarthy, the Belfast cruiserweight, stopped Francesco Cataldo, who was admittedly a late substitute.
In Matchroom’s debut Italian show, in Florence last November, Martin J Ward beat Devis Boschiero, while Joe Hughes beat Andrea Scarpa for the European super-lightweight title.
Boschiero scored his second win since that loss to Hughes, as he stopped Ivan Tomas, of Barcelona, Spain, on tonight’s bill, a bad cut over the Spaniard’s right eye ending proceedings 1:30 into the eighth of a scheduled ten.
Also on the bill, Mohammed Obbadi, the former EU flyweight champion from Tuscany, Italy, was an eight-round points winner over Cristian Narvaez, from Nicaragua, via Spain, winning by scores of 80-72 (twice) and 79-73.