Indi Sangha says if you want some idea how he’s going to become a star next year, go on YouTube and type in “Prince Naseem Hamed.”
“Nobody else in Britain at the moment has a style like mine,” said the 7-0, 22 year-old Midlander.
“I’m different and different is good.
“Being different gets me noticed.
“I take bits from all the great fighters, but I like to use Naz’s style. The same shots that worked for Naz work for me too. I’ve got all the shots he had.”
Those shots include a leaping lead uppercut, a reverse one-two and like Naz, Sangha is comfortable in both stances.
Now with Jon Pegg at his Eastside gym in Birmingham, Sangha started out in the pros under Clifton Mitchell in Derby – and gives him credit for developing him since he turned pro in March, 2015 after only a handful of amateur bouts.
Mitchell, who has been saying for a year or so that Sangha “could be special,” fought out of the Ingles’ gym during his own pro career and Sangha said: “Clifton knows my style, knows what I’m trying to do in there.
“The style is like the Ingles’ – but it’s different.”
Sangha describes himself as “a slippery power puncher,” but the stats show only one KO and when Boxing Social saw him against Norbert Kalucza earlier this year, he tried rather too hard to get the stoppage, repeatedly jumping in with lead hooks that seldom landed.
That was his last fight with Mitchell, a move across the Midlands leading him to the Eastside gym.
His first fight under Pegg and Paul ‘Soggy’ Counihan was a definite success, a six-round schooling of former Midlands Area super-featherweight champion Paul Holt at Villa Park in September.
Pegg likes the look of Sangha – “He has natural skills, is awkward and doesn’t get nervous” – and the Birmingham Mail were impressed by his performance against Holt, headlining their report ‘A Star Is Born.’
The writer of the piece, Mike Lockley, knows his boxing. He was assistant editor at Boxing News in the 1980s.
Holt was rather made for Sangha, who likes opponents who come to him, and they could meet again in the forthcoming Midlands Boxing Super Series, set up to determine the next Midlands Area super-featherweight champion.
Holt, a gutsy, take one-to-give-one left hander who seems to be forever retiring and unretiring on social media, should be in the eight-man line up for the tournament, pencilled in to start in February.
Bookmakers will be giving odds on the tournament – set to also include the huge Joe Ducker from the Shinfields’ gym and Tamworth’s capable Josh Baillie – and expect Sangha to be their favourite.
“I proved I’m way beyond that level already and now I’m looking to push on,” he said with a Naz-like confidence. “Once the TV promoters see me, I will get pushed on. I need to get on TV because when people see me, they remember me. I put on a show.”
Sangha, a slightly unhinged interviewee who says he was forever scrapping on the streets before taking up the Noble Art at 16, reckons he can box from bantamweight all the way up to lightweight.
He was going to challenge Ash Lane for his Midlands Area championship at 8st 6lbs in Derby earlier this year, but because of other commitments, Lane had to pull out.
Before the fight fell through, Sangha did a good job of antagonising Lane with his brash predictions on social media.
“I’m very confident,” he said.
“I train really hard, I’m improving all the time and I really want this.
“I’m going to be making a lot of noise in 2018.”
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