It’s wild and woolly as Harty earns draw

Harty and Wako let the punches fly. Picture: Manjit Narotra/BCB

IN wildly unorthodox Mohammed Wako, Jimmy Harty caught a tiger by the tail – and was very nearly clawed.

On BCB’s Friday show at the Hangar, Wolverhampton, the home city newcomer came perilously close to losing his unbeaten record in his second contest.

After four frantic rounds, referee Peter McCormack couldn’t separate the pair, scoring a 38-38 stalemate. I had Wako, an Ethiopian boxing out of York, winning, but will accept the contest was a matter of interpretation.

You either leaned towards 24-year-old Harty’s better boxer or were swayed by the sheer volume of punches hurled – some of them starting from his knees – by Wako.

He didn’t stop throwing from first bell to last. Harty was subjected to an incessant storm of leather and even though his opponent was, at times, wide open, Jimmy couldn’t summon the power to make the African pay.

Wako faced fellow BCB boxer Lewis Morris in Cannock earlier this year. The Walsall fighter – a man with championship experience – had the moves, poise and experience to handle Wako with ease.

Harty found himself sucked into a slugging match.

In the second it looked as if he’d settle down and had found a way to end the free swinging nightmare.

Yet Wako (9st 4lbs) kept coming and coming like a man possessed. The visitor, who enjoyed noisy support,  was clipped by a crisp right in the third, took it, then flung himself back into the fray, landing left hooks. At one point he almost fell through the ropes after missing widely with a swing any bowler would be proud of.

The action was so wild and woolly – so far from the textbook – that it was inevitable heads would collide and Harty (9st 2lbs) emerged from an exchange cut over his left eye.

The sight of blood pushed Wako’s workrate, already off the scale, to another level. He just kept throwing in the last and, on my card, sealed the win by a round.

Harty should be comforted by the fact he’ll never face a fighter like Mohammed Wako again.