Harry moves camp in fresh start by Tom Podmore Mar 27th 2008

Harry ‘The Master' Ramogoadi, the crafty South African-born featherweight based in the Midlands, has joined the flourishing Nottingham stable of trainer Tony Harris and manager Jimmy Gill in a final effort to revive his career. The 32-year-old former British Masters featherweight champion has talent but endured a frustrating 2007, winning only one of three bouts. He lost in six rounds to Kevin Mitchell for the Commonwealth super-featherweight and also lost a close eight-rounder to fellow-South African Tshifhiwa Munyai last June. Sandwiched between those setbacks was an impressive four-round dismissal of heavier Magyar Ferenc Szabo, who came to have a go, in his adopted hometown almost 12 months ago. And although inactive since that 77-75 defeat to the unbeaten and long-limbed former Commonwealth bantamweight boss in London, many thinking he deserved a share of the contest, the link up with Harris and Gill, Frank Maloney's long-serving matchmaker, in the East Midlands could see him get regular work. Ramogoadi has gone 8-6 (4) since relocating to England in 2003, though all of those deficits have come against stellar men: unbeaten English lightweight boss John Murray, WBF featherweight champ Choi Tsveenpurev (twice), former European featherweight champion Nicky Cook and the aforementioned duo of Mitchell and Munyai. He has also sprung a few shocks along the way. Leeds' Danny Wallace, who challenges for the vacant English super-bantamweight belt this week, was outpointed over six and the 2002 Commonwealth Games gold medallist at lightweight, Welshman Jamie Arthur, was dropped and stopped in five rounds. Harry, 18-8-2 (4), also holds a standout six-round win over Malcolm Klassen, who would go on to win the IBF world super-featherweight title against future Amir Khan victim Gary St Clair, and a six-round draw with world-rated countryman Thomas Mashaba – both in 2001. That is the form the Rugby-based stylist will be looking to get back to under Harris, who has the Booth brothers (reigning Commonwealth bantamweight boss Jason and former British champion Nicky), featherweight contender Barrington Brown and unbeaten Leicester super-middleweight prospect Rasham Singh-Sohi at his Nottingham gym. “Harry will be training in Nottingham during the week,” Gill told the Nottingham Evening Post. “He comes up for British citizenship soon and he wants to get himself fit and really give it a go. A couple of decent wins could put him in the picture for titles, be it English, British or Commonwealth, at featherweight.”

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