Pride Promotions Looks at Jan Dub Show

By Jonny Stapleton

FRUSTRATED fighter Anthony Fitzgerald has elected to take fight matters into his own hands and has set up his promotion company.

The WBA world number 13 has suffered a frustrating boxing sabbatical since a career best victory over Affif Belghecham last March.

The 26 year old has struggled to secure a fight of note and despite a high ranking his efforts to lure big names like Andy Lee into the ring have been hampered by a lack of financial backing.

‘The Pride’ has unsuccessfully scoured the globe for a meaningful contest to no avail while former promoters Dolphil have collapsed.

So in a bid to move his career to the next level the EBA Middleweight champion and Irish super middleweight champion has elected to promote himself.

The inner city Dub has already began work on a January debut show  and is targeting a name worthy of keeping his world level combat dreams alive.

“It has been a frustrating few weeks. Fights falling through, people not wanting to fight us, not having the money to tempt names over and so fort. I don’t want to hang around. I am 13 in the world at present, I hold three belts and I am approaching my prime,” Fitzgerald told www.irishboxing.com.

“No one else could sort out a fight for me. There is now point in moping about so I will do it myself. I have a team of backers with me and a big fan base and I am confident I can secure a name that will excite fans for the first show and build from there. I am really excited about this.”

The promotion work load could certainly detract from Fitzgerald’s training and in turn performance. However the middleweight believes his delegation skills as good as his over hand right and believes his promotion team will be as effective as his corner have proved in recent fights.

“I won’t be doing everything myself. I have a good team of people working with me. Believe me I will be focused on fighting and I will train as hard as ever.”