Conah Walker calls out Conor Benn after stopping Sam Eggington

Conah Walker calls out Conor Benn after stopping Sam Eggington

Conah Walker stopped Sam Eggington in round 10 of their derby fight on May 2 in Wolverhampton.

After outboxing the 30-year-old Walker in the opening round, accurately spearing his jab and following up with his backhand right, 'The Savage' found the call of warfare too much to resist in the second stanza.

All it took was a swiping counter from Walker and the former IBO world champion Eggington stepped inside – immediately giving up his advantage in reach – and let rip. And so it began.

Eggington commanded the third with his right uppercut and vaster experience. 'The Wolf' Walker, caught unaware, started to realize the extent of the warrior he was sharing a ring with. What followed was a titanic battle of wills, a hellacious exhibition of violence.

Wolverhampton's Walker promised not to lose “on his patch," but this was a fierce local derby where anything could happen, with Eggington hailing from Stourbridge, a town less than 10 miles down the road from the Civic Hall in which they battled.

Eggington, 32, again bossed the fourth, but Walker refused to take a backward step. The younger man battled back in the fifth. A body shot hurt Eggington before the veteran regained control in the next round. He even teased making things easier in the seventh – simple one-twos were poking Walker off balance – but a meeting between these two was never destined to be so tame.

By the eighth, Eggington, with his war-torn face bearing new wounds, looked to be tiring. He instinctively retreated to the ropes. Walker followed, and furious exchanges were punctuated by a roaring up-and-under that sent Eggington to the mat. It looked like the end. Perhaps, given all that came before in Eggington’s 36-10 (20 KOs) career, it should have been.

A turnaround was threatened in the ninth, but Walker would not be denied. The action was breathtaking and becoming increasingly hard to watch as Eggington, years of combat stealing his ability to retaliate, started to sag. A brutal five-punch attack from Walker, which started with a right hook and ended with the same punch from his left, almost rendered Eggington unconscious, but, typically, he was still standing. At 1:59 of the 10th round, the referee at last stopped the fight.

“He outdone me this time, what more can I say?” Eggington said afterwards.

“I don’t know where I go from here. Fingers crossed, I get some more opportunities, but if I don’t, we’ll have to see what happens.”

“I’ve looked up to this man my whole career,” Walker, 18-3-1 (9 KOs), said in victory. “I’ve tried to emulate his style; he’s shown me you can win every fight and do anything that you put your fucking mind to.

“He was a great dance partner.”

He then turned his attention to another countryman.

“Conor Benn, you think you’re the man in England? Come and prove it then, big boy. Come and fucking prove it.”

Undercard

On the undercard, the feel-good story that seems to be building for 38-year-old Bilal Fawaz produced its latest chapter when he moved to 12-1-1 (4 KOs) to retain his British and Commonwealth junior middleweight titles for the first time.

Ryan Kelly, 20-7-1 (8 KOs), was brave but ultimately outclassed as Fawaz, enjoying every moment – perhaps to a fault, given the premature showboating on display – eventually forced the referee to step in at the end of the ninth round.