Team Hammo Boxing is the first boxing club in Glen Innes in a decade and is run by locally based professional Michael Hamilton, whose young charges David Wagner and Jayden Connell both scored points victories over their Inverell opponents at the Inverell Jockey Club on Saturday night. 

Wagner who has now won three fights as an amateur was unlucky not to score a knockout victory, dropping his opponent twice according to Hamilton.

“Both the boys won on points but Dave had an eight count in the first round and then again in the third round, if the fight went any longer they probably would’ve had to stop it,” he said.

“It was Jayden’s first fight he fought a bloke who had three fights and he got up which was really good, it was Dave’s third fight and he won and he’s now got three wins.”

Connell was pleased to win his first amateur fight, lining up in the 75kg division, though he did admit to a slow start due to nerves.

“I was a bit nervy at first, the first round took a bit to get my head in the game but once I copped a few punches I woke up a bit and came out in the second round more calm and just looked to box from there, by the third round I was pretty tired my legs and arms were sore,” Connell said.

For Wagner who fought in the 62kg division he was happy to have executed the game plan laid out by his trainer which led him to his third victory with the gloves.

“It all went to plan I set out to open him up with body shots and get him to open up his guard and then look to score on him,” Wagner said.

The fighters are very dedicated training five days a week under Hamilton who himself remains unbeaten with one win from his first fight as a professional with his second fight pencilled in for January. 

Team Hammo is based out of a  shed at the back of a Glen Innes home and it more than does the job according to Connell.

“We’ve got our own little setup here and it does the job, it got us ready,” he said.

 Hamilton said he has taken what he has learnt through his amateur and professional careers and applied it to training the two amateurs. 

“I’ve pretty much trained them how I’ve been trained to fight by my professional trainer so they fight in a similar way,” he said.

The next fights for the Team Hammo boxers will be in Woodburn in three weeks’ time with Wagner a definite starter and Connell possible to get on the card as well.