Corner Inlet Cup a huge hit

AFTER training young athletes to compete at state and national events and a quartet of Kiribati talents to the Commonwealth Games, the Corner Inlet Boxing Club hosted their own event on the weekend. 

The Corner Inlet Cup 4 was a Boxing Victoria Association event, and it featured an elite card, with 20 bouts across Sunday afternoon wowing the great crowd at the Leongatha Memorial Hall. 
Coach Brad Anderson spoke on the event and what it means to his beloved club. 

“It’s a big fundraiser for us being a non-for-profit organisation, its promoting amateur boxing in the region and getting everyone in the community to see what it’s about,” he said.

“A few people I’ve spoken to today said it’s the first time they’d ever been to anything like this.”

He also touched on what it means for the athletes themselves, both young and old. 

“It’s a platform for some kids to reach other levels, we’ve got a couple in their first bout and they’ll be able to say, ‘hey I’ve actually stepped in the ring’, a lot of people can say they’ve played footy, netball and tennis but not everyone can say I’ve hopped in the ring.”

“We try and really promote it; Scotty (Bindloss) has done a ton of work getting this card up and running, we’ve got a lot of guys from the ACT and Tassie and it’s a quality card.

“Especially when you get into the elite there’s some really good fighters it’s really good to showcase some elite fights here in Leongatha, South Gippsland.”

The club had six representatives take their respective parts in the day’s proceedings, with Zane Lewis, Alex Jones, Jemima Geitz and Max Woodman making their debuts and Sebastian Saulwick and Eriu Tamaku taking to the ring as well. 

Tamaku took the win in a very skilful fight, he was one of four Kiribati athletes who competed in June’s Commonwealth Games, after training with Scott Bindloss at the Corner Inlet Boxing Club. 

Tamaku returned to the club to further his development and following his victory in Sunday’s event, he is off to New Zealand in two weeks followed by a trip to Adelaide to compete in the Australian titles where he’ll fight for Victoria. 

The club itself is building nicely after a tough patch post COVID as Anderson explained. 

“We feel like we’re climbing up, COVID has really hurt us along with other sports, we are a minority sport, we’ve got a lot of kids both boys and girls,” he said.  

The event was a huge success and many of the club’s young boys and girls Anderson mentioned were able to watch on and get a taste of what a major event is all about and also got to spar pre-event. 
Anderson is also extremely grateful for the plethora of sponsors that have taken up partnership with, and supported, the club. 

“We’ve got some really good sponsors, the community has been really generous, we’ve had people travel from Tassie, ACT and Melbourne of course thanks to everyone who turned up it was great to see so many people at the event,” he said.