New Dublin show promising title fights, debuts, and comebacks

Assassin Promotions are going to get the umbrella out and brave the so called ‘bad Dublin boxing climate’.

Just weeks after Dublin boxing was declared dead, the relatively new to the scene promotional outfit confirmed what they promise will be an exciting fight night for Tallaght and October 6th.

The ‘Rise Again’ title for the show is most likely linked to the gloom surrounding the public fall out that lead to the July 7th JB Promotions show being cancelled and indeed the end of said promotional company.

A bad July came on the back of the Roy Sheehan Last Man Standing non-payment fiasco, the cancellation of an SK Promotions show, Katie Taylor’s homecoming being indefinitely shelved, and MTK Global’s decree that they will no longer look to box their fighters on Irish cards.

Boxing Ireland and Tony Davitt Promotions have soldiered on and Davitt, Leonard Gunning and Stephen Sharpe ran a much-needed and successful show on July 14th – with ‘Celtic Clash 7’ now in the pipeline.

Assassin are eager to do the same with their first bill at the National Basketball Arena and, speaking to Irish-Boxing.com, Conor Slater claimed they are focused on doing right by their fighters and remain hopeful that will only help inject more life back into the fight game in the capital.

“There’s been a lot said about the state of boxing in Dublin, we just keep our head down and try to deliver what’s best for our fighters in Ireland. We all want Dublin boxing to be striving and, if we can be of any help to that, we will,” said Slater.

Slater claims Assassin will soon have a stable packed with 25 Irish fighters [currently managing 13], implying that they have enough talent to run shows on their own, but has expressed a willingness to work with the other promoters having co-operated with Boxing Ireland, Red Corner, JB Promotions, and MTK over the past year.

“We are building a strong stable here whereby we can always work from within, and we have now enabled ourselves to promote shows and give our fighters the dates they require,” he continued.

“Having said that, we are open to working with everyone, we have spoke to Leonard, Stephen, Tony and Jay [Byrne] and a few others about getting their managed boxers on the show, so I see no reason why we can’t all work together.”

Yesterday Assassin, who along with Red Corner secured terrestrial TV via TG4 for Last Man Standing Card, announced their first show revealing the date and venue.

News regarding the line-up will be released over the coming weeks and by this time next month Slater is confident Irish fight fans will be salivating over a very strong card.

The Londoner outlined how “we are really excited for this show. We have some title fights lined up, a couple of debuts, and some familiar faces back in action.

“We feel in four weeks time, when all announcements for the show are done, people will be sitting there saying ‘Wow, this is good’.”

‘Rise Again’ will take place in Tallaght at the National Bastketball Arena, seven years on from the last show to take place at the venue.

The change of venue is date orientated, but Slater is excited about the prospect of a show at a venue where the likes of Wayne McCullough, Naseem Hamed and  Michael Carruth all fought.

“It came down to the dates, we couldn’t have gone too early in September as lads are still on holidays and will want a full camp. And then we couldn’t have gone too much later in October, as ideally we will be getting all these guys out again once or twice before Christmas.”

“So we had a small bracket. The Stadium was the only obvious option but it was booked. We wanted to explore somewhere new and exciting, and we wanted to go with somewhere iconic and make a statement. We looked around the venues, and for size, availability and the history, and The Basketball Arena fit the bill.”