On November 7, 1975, boxing published an article about Ray Fallone in Battersea under the header: “Ray intends to get out with the win.” Three days later, Ray entered the ring for the eight -sided Hampston from Lewisham at the Greyhound Hotel, Croydon, on his hundredth professional trip. Despite the teenage Mick’s dish, many to think about, Ray was overtaken. BN informed that “Ray was never injured and, truthfully, for most of the competition with a wide smile on his face. He finished the fight unmarked.”
In the end, Ray Sportings clapped the opponent before he was awarded the heated tribute to the secretary of the board Ray Clarke. At that time, it was widely recognized that Ray would be the last of the 100-professionals, that was the state of the game. There were a few excellent fighters around, but there were simply enough programs to have so many duels, especially since the boxers were shorter and more hard.
Quickly to 2019, when in annual British rankings BN mentioned the names of eight boxers, then busy who joined the “100 club”, and two of them had 200 fights or more. In the period from 1975 to now, but especially from the mid -1990s, many warriors have become Centurions, and Peter Buckley and Kristian Laight had 300 competitions or more. This group of boxers was managed by Seamus Casey and Dean Bramhald.
Nobody in 1975 would predict that this could happen. The reason he did is the appearance of the “journeyman”-the rheion’s veteran, often boxing a week by week, and there to test the potential of a “home” warrior. I saw most of these boys myself, usually from the ring, and I can testify to their ring. Most of them are much better than their record suggests, and readers of Peter Buckley’s last book, King of the Welfmen, will appreciate how much is needed to be able to play this role.
In football, joining the “100 club” is usually reserved for the best – for example, 100 Premier League goals or 100 hats in England. In the cricket, getting the first century is a sign of a very good trker, and only 25 players in the history of the game have won 100 centuries. In boxing, the opposite is true, because it seems that only journeymen, many years of losers, manage to have 100 competitions. The most successful boxers rarely approach this number, but it was not always the case.
The first over 100 professionals began to appear in the first few years of the 20th century, and most of them had long careers in compact rooms in London. I have records of over 1000 British and Irish fighters who managed to join this club, and they won much more fights from them than lost. Their real splendor took place in the 1930s, when 740 boxers who fought during this decade had 100 matches or more, and 546 of them have records. Many of them have become British, European and even the world. The most famed of them is probably Len Wickwar, for which I traced 471 competitions.
I choose only one of those boxing centurions to demonstrate the type of boxer that we had at that time. Arthur “Boy” Edge from Smethwick, Fly Wagi and Bantam’s weight, operated only seven years in 1928–1935, losing only 37 out of 150 competitions. He fought with two British titles eliminators, organized both a fly weight in the southern area and Bantamieght, and defeated the masters, and then retired in the mid -1920s, along with the cauliflower ear.
Each member of this honorary club deserves great recognition – Buckley, Edge, Fallone and all the rest, i.e. the masters, the journeymen, the winner or losers, because they are the spine of sport.
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