ST IVES ABC club captain Bradley Chapman topped the bill in Norwich against home fighter DJ Perry on Saturday night and left with a unanimous win.

ST IVES ABC club captain Bradley Chapman topped the bill in Norwich against home fighter DJ Perry on Saturday night and left with a unanimous win.

Perry was a lot more experienced than Chapman and had advantages in height and reach, but hadn’t expected Chapman to be so proficient at boxing defensively, as he tends to get involved in exciting scraps.

Chapman boxed cleverly in the first round, picking off Perry as he came forward and landing some flush body punches.

And the Ives boxer then picked up the pace in the second and third and acted a bit more aggressively, constantly catching Perry napping with an overhand right, which shook Perry down to his boots.

Chapman finished strongly with hooks to body and head in the last, but still kept his cool boxing style which paid dividends and gave him a unanimous victory in what his coach Steve Whitwell said “was perhaps his most polished performance to date.”

Club mate Scott Pepper fought in Nottingham on Friday night but lost unanimously against Sean Rickett from Bennys ABC.

Pepper has been unable to transfer his gym performances into the ring and this was the case again, but this was by far his most honest performance and didn’t stop trying against the more experienced opponent.

It was a close bout, but Pepper once again failed to get his timing off and fell short too often to make up the deficit.

St Ives Corn Exchange is staging the club’s last open show of the season on Friday night.

Eight home boxers will be in action, including Bradley Chapman, Dan Meston, Shona Whitwell, Tommy Maguire, Martin Rooney, Bradley Smith, Tersoo Sugden and Scott Pepper.

There are also some cracking supporting bouts and the club hopes to equal the success of the sell-out show back in February.

One fighter who won’t be competing on Friday is Tommy Martin, who is instead competing in a Junior ABA National Championships quarter-final in Brentwood the following day.

Martin is Ives’ last boy left in the championships and has a tough task ahead of him but, as well as growing in confidence, is showing great form and will have benefited from two close bouts with national champions already this season.

Shona Whitwell, meanwhile, is also having a warm up on Friday for her first national championships coming up in May and is also looking like one of the favourites to win.

Tickets are still available for the show on Friday night, priced at �15, and are available by calling Steve Whitwell on 07918 104819.