LAUNCESTON welterweight Wes Smith remains unbeaten in the professional ranks following a thrilling draw with Damian Kiwior at a packed Walsall Town Hall on Saturday night.

Smith, 26, was fighting for the first time since a draw against Ireland’s Rohan Date back in July and was looking to extend his record to four wins and a draw from his five contests.

To add to the interest, Smith was competing in his first six-rounder as a pro while Kiwior, a decorated amateur back in his native Poland, was looking to bounce back from his first defeat to Chris Jenkinson back in December.

Smith was backed by a sizeable following who made the three-hour plus trip up the M5 to Birmingham, and from the opening bell took control of the contest, keeping Kiwior on the end of lightning-fast and accurate jabs before following them up with solid uppercuts and right crosses to the chin. Kiwior struggled to counter with anything solid due to superb lateral movement from the Altarnun native, and at the end of the first round, it appeared that Smith was one round to the good.

The second round saw the very strong Walsall fighter have a little more success by forcing a higher pace and occasionally finding solid hooks to the body and head. But Smith wasn’t fazed and matched the pace, connecting with solid shots of his own and still creating problems for Kiwior to get near him due to his clever footwork. 

The third three-minute round saw Smith elect to change tactics and hold his feet in a bid to out-muscle his opponent which allowed the rushing Kiwior to get closer and work the body. Smith defended well but sustained a small cut over the left eye after an accidental clash of heads. Kiwior seized the moment and let the shots fly as the Cornishman was struggling to see due to the blood leaking into his eye. However, Smith braved the storm to the bell to allow his corner to work on the injury. Carl Robson from Carl’s Boxing Stable in Plymouth was able to stop the cut from bleeding any further into the eye.

The Launceston fighter went out for the second half of the contest with a refuse to lose mentality and unleashed the Cornish storm with the very tough Polish man having the same thing on his mind. The fight turned into an all-out war with both boxers landing bombs on each other’s body and head.

This round and the next saw both fighters have their successes and both having their chins, courage and fitness tested to the limit, with both refusing to give ground. Neither fighter was able to dominate the other with both rounds being fairly close.

The sixth and final round saw Smith go back to his boxing skills and lead off with a fast jab, pivot around the angle and follow up with thunderous right crosses and left hooks to Kiwior’s head. As per earlier in the contest, Kiwior struggled when there was nothing directly in front of him to hit and Smith was able to out manoeuvre and out punch his opponent to the final bell.

As with all non-title fights, the referee scores the rounds with ten points to the winner of the round, nine points to who lost the round and ten points each if the round is a draw. In this contest the referee scored two rounds in each fighters favour, while two rounds were even. Therefore the contest was declared a draw. Smith was disappointed not to get the win but most importantly, still remains unbeaten.

He said: “It wasn’t a bad performance but it wasn’t my best. I boxed a bit of a wrong game as rather than using my boxing skills I ended up trying to fight him as he was shorter than me.

But the decision was fairly fair and a draw away from home isn’t a bad result. It was a close fight and he was stronger than I thought.

“I’d like to thank everyone for coming up, Des (Charnock) for training me and Connor Phillips at Sport Support for keeping me in shape!”

Des added: “A huge thanks must go out to all the Launceston supporters who raised the roof for their beloved fighter and at times, sounded like they outnumbered Kiwior’s fans.”