Following Friday evening’s much-talked about fight between Azinga ‘Golden Boy’ Fuzile and Asanda ‘Dynamite’ Gingqi at the Orient Theatre in KuGompo City, boxing fans must forget about a rematch between the two adversaries.
This is according to Mlandeli Tengimfene, who manages Duncan Village-born Fuzile, a former South African featherweight and one-time International Boxing Federation (IBF) junior-lightweight title contender.
In a 10 rounds non-title bout, which pitted a Mdantsane boxer and his Duncan Village counterpart, Fuzile emerged victorious via a majority decision. However, there are sections of the boxing community, who strongly believe that Gingqi, a current SA junior-lightweight champion, did enough to win the fight.
“The fight for Azinga Fuzile was to re-ignite his inactivity after a year lay-off, to rub cobwebs off his way and skimming the ring rust. Derby, to me, was neither here nor there, hence my stance of no rematch,” Tengimfene said.
The award-winning boxing manager added: “Why must I feed that derby narrative that I am not interested in? Fuzile could have fought any opponent available for the sake of activity and rubbing off cobwebs. Unfortunately, there were none except Gingqi and I thank him for standing up and availed himself for the fight.”
Tengimfene, the 2017 Manager of the Year award winner, revealed that the 29-year-old Fuzile will now be back in action in five months’ time.
“That chapter with Gingqi is closed and boxing lovers must not have any illusions of a rematch as long Fuzile is still managed by me and promoted by Last Born Boxing Promotions. Gingqi, like any boxer, gave Azinga a good fight and both boxers were ready and deserved to be applauded of their performances,” Tengimfene remarked.
“Now, the focus on my side will be the return of the Last Born Tete and the co-main bout being Azinga early September. On behalf of the Golden Boy, I wish to relay his appreciation of support to all his fans for being there from the day he stepped into the ring in 2014 and he is promising to do his best not to disappoint them henceforth.” – Monwabisi Jimlongo
