British Lionhearts begin World Series with victory
BySportsbeat
Published 22/01/2016 at 10:11 GMT
British Lionhearts kicked off the sixth season of the World Series of Boxing with a narrow 3-2 success over the USA Knockouts in Miami thanks to Lawrence Okolie's win by split decision in the decider against Cam Awesome.
Eurosport
Image credit: Eurosport
The British heavyweight, making his debut in the competition, claimed a 48-47 win with two of the judges in the five-round contest, and that proved just enough as Awesome got the other decision by the same score at the Miccosukee Sports & Entertainemtn Dome.
Okolie went into the bout with the teams level at 2-2 after Harvey Horn had helped the Lionhearts into an early lead at light flyweight, which was then cancelled out by Shakur Stevenson in the Bantamweight.
Pat McCormack responded for the Lionshearts at light welterweight and despite Charles Conwell's middleweight success for the Knockouts, Okolie came through in the crucial bout.
And British Lionhearts Coach Lee Pullen believes successes away from home are hard to come by.
"Away victories in WSB are always hard fought so the team has done superbly to secure the win," said Pullen.
"To come here with such an inexperienced team, including two WSB debutants, and leave with the win is a tremendous performance.
"All of the boxers acquitted themselves very well and even those that did not win tonight will have learnt a lot from the experience."
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