An eight-member Bahrain Royal Guard boxing team, including a female pugilist, will square off against an elite boxing unit of the British Army at the Infantry Training Centre (ITC) in Catterick, North Yorkshire tomorrow.
Supreme Council for Youth and Sport first deputy chairman, General Sports Authority chairman and Bahrain Olympic Committee president Shaikh Khalid bin Hamad Al Khalifa, who is flying to England specially for the occasion, will be present at the competition which will feature eight bouts.
The event is a follow-up to last year’s ‘Royal Rumble’, held at the Bahrain Rugby Football Club (BRFC), which pitted a nine-member team of the British Army’s Royal Regiment of Fusiliers against the Royal Guard.
The Royal Guard triumphed, 8-1, in that contest with the sole Fusiliers win coming in the very first bout.
This time, however, the Royal Guard will be up against much tougher opponents, Bahrain Boxing Federation (BBF) technical development manager and national team coach Tony Davis told the GDN by phone from Catterick.
“Our team will be up against the best boxers of the British Army,” he said.
“And it’s going to be a tougher proposition than what we faced against the Fusiliers.
“But our team has been training hard since we arrived in Catterick last week. Apart from the eight boxers who will fight on Thursday, we’ve brought a couple of other young boxers along with us just so they can gain some experience along with a couple of coaches and BBF officials.”
The collaboration with the British Army is an initiative that Davis – a former ABA senior light heavyweight champion and former British military boxing coach who also served as the World Class Performance Coach on the GB Boxing Olympic programme – came up with as part of his efforts to promote the sport in Bahrain.
And, to set up the event in Chatterick, Davis simply linked up with one of his former protégés.
“I used to head up the British Army team and the head coach there is one of my former boxers,” Davis said.
“So it’s good to have this collaboration. Of course, it’ll be at a different level compared to the Royal Rumble and it’ll allow our boxers to not only gain some quality fighting experience but also some valuable life experiences.
“And, of course, the British Army will field their elite team which means that our boxers will be really tested. We will have seven men’s bouts and there will be one women’s bout also in which our Maryam Khamis will go up against England’s national champion – who is also from the army.”
Davis speaks highly of Khamis, who recently created history by becoming the first Bahraini woman to ever win a gold medal at an international boxing event when she defeated Saudi Arabia’s Hala Alrashidi in the women’s 54kg final in the World Combat Games in Riyadh.
And, while he would like to see the Royal Guard walk away with the honours just as they did in the Royal Rumble last year, Davis said the experience of the British Army boxers would probably work in their favour.
“On paper, it looks like a bit of a whitewash for the British Army in terms of experience,” he explained.
“However, you never really know what will happen on the day, just as in the Royal Rumble where an 8-1 result in our favour was beyond our most optimistic expectations.
“And what will make this occasion even more special is the fact that Shaikh Khalid will be here to watch the action. That shows how much this means to him because, after all, our efforts to promote the sport are happening under his patronage.
Boxing fans in Bahrain will be able to see the action live on the British Forces Broadcasting Service (BFBC) which will broadcast the event live.
“It’ll be a great chance for everyone in Bahrain to tune in to watch their boxers taking on some of the best the British Army has to offer,” Davis said.
And Bahraini boxing fans will have a chance to actually be ring-side at another face-off between boxers from the two countries’ militaries on November 30 with the Royal Guard taking on the British Army’s Parachute Regiment this time, again at the BRFC.
ROYAL GUARD Team: Taha Ahmed, Mohamed Fakhr, Omar Budahei, Prakash Limbu, Ali Jaffar, Rasheed Mehrinfar, Nurkhan Masyibev and Maryam Khamis.
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