The revival of professional boxing in T&T is finally here.
The country is on the cusp of all-professional and Pro-Am boxing cards now, following a collaboration between the Alafin Fight and Event Promotions Ltd and the Cosmic Boxing Gym in Marabella on Friday, a partnership that will see the return of professional boxing in T&T after a long lay off.
At a launch at the Cosmic Boxing Gym on Battoo Avenue, Marabella on Friday, Cuban Dr Adonis Diaz Fernandez, who has been living in T&T for the past 10 years with his wife Nemis Lagar, announced that his company Alafin Fights and Events Promotion has been registered in T&T which now enables boxers to move from the amateur level to the professional level, a move that will help local boxers, as well as the sport in T&T.
"I want to say thanks to the Cosmic Boxing Gym for the collaboration with our company and thanks to the T&T Boxing Association (TTBA) for doing this promotion.
"The Alafin Fights and Events Promotions Ltd is a company that is registered here in T&T and it intends to have boxers based here in T&T represent the country at the professional level. We now have two boxers who came in from Cuba and they are fighters who have lots of experience at the amateur level, but right now they want to go to the next level to be professionals," said Fernandez.
"Professional boxing has had some stories here in T&T in the 1980s, but from that time professional boxing started to get low and we intend to revive it. We want to invite all the local boxers because we are concentrating on the communities to ensure that boxers will achieve their dream of becoming professional boxers.
"Right now, I am looking to have competitions here in Trinidad for international, regional, and intercontinental fights. Right now we are linking with different match-makers and promoters from other countries and different commissions that sanction boxing."
A date has not been set for the start of a pro card. Fernandez said he is awaiting responses from the international promoters and match-makers before any card can be determined.
The initiative has received its blessings from both the T&T Boxing Board of Control, as well as the TTBA. Several local fighters have won world titles on local shores in the past, such as Leslie 'Tiger' Stewart, Jiselle Salandy who later died in a car crash, and Ria Ramnarine among many others.
However, the sport professionally died a natural death for several reasons. Boxing coach Vicky Boodram, who represented both the boxing association and the Cosmic Boxing Gym at the launch, said there is a dire need for professional boxing to be revived in T&T.
"It is a good avenue for many of our amateur boxers in T&T because, in the past, we have seen that our boxers have been unable to go forward into the professional realm, so with this partnership, we are hoping, and we would love for the local boxers to benefit from having the Cubans here, the Cuban coaches here.
"The TTBA would also like to work with the Cubans, even our amateur teams as we attempt to build boxing in T&T," Boodram explained.
Cuban boxers Roiler Pascual Zamora (122 lbs) and Dairel Vazquez Sanchez (168 lbs) have been in T&T training at the Cosmic Gym under coach Damian Cantero in anticipation of jump-starting the professional fight against local fighters.
Fernandez said they are also targeting boxers from the Caribbean region, Venezuela, and Colombia among other nations to come here to fight professionally. He noted that the initiative would help in building the records of many T&T fighters who would later move on to contest world title fights in the future.