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Dube back in the ring

Sport
AFTER a three year absence in the ring, former WBA Pan African heavyweight boxing champion Thamsanqa Dube will make a comeback when he fights Trevor Mpofu

AFTER a three year absence in the ring, former WBA Pan African heavyweight boxing champion Thamsanqa Dube will make a comeback when he fights Trevor Mpofu in a non-title contest in Harare next month.

BY SUKOLUHLE MTHETHWA

The boxing bill will be staged at Harare Showgrounds on March 28, according to veteran boxing coach Phillip “Striker” Ndlovu.

Clyde Musonda from Harare is promoting the fight.

“Thamsanqa (Dube) and Trevor (Mpofu) are going to fight in an elimination contest on March 28 in Harare. The winner will face South Africa-based heavyweight boxer Elvis Moyo in Bulawayo on June 27. It promises to be a big exciting fight as Thamsanqa seems to be very serious. I can tell boxing fans that he has reformed. He comes very early to the gym and listens to instructions.

“He might have gone to see a psychologist who told him that his life is in boxing because he has certainly changed. He is showing the spirit he showed in 2001 for the first time in years,” he said.

“I train Trevor in the morning and Thamsanga in the afternoon at Tshaka Youth Centre. Both boxers are taking the fight very seriously. We want to shed Thamsanqa’s weight in the next seven weeks he should be around 120kgs,” said Ndlovu.

Dube last fought on August 29 2011 in South Africa where he lost to Democratic Republic of Congo’s born boxer Flo Simba at Emperors Palace in a non-title fight.

That year, he lost the WBA Pan African Boxing title after failing to secure a fight to defend the title he won after beating South African Jack Els in 2009.

Dube won the African title when he beat Els in Johannesburg but he failed to secure a fight to defend the title within the require time-frame.

Mpofu has been itching to fight Dube. The then 20-year-old told this publication in 2013: “I want to fight Dube next year. I want to challenge him for the national title fight because he has held that title for too long (Zimbabwe heavyweight title).”