Udofia victorious on pro debut

The 22-year-old former Hockwell Ring ABC fighter, faced off against Sonny Whiting on the Goodwin Promotions bill and was declared the winner on points by the judges after four rounds.

Udofia admitted there had been a touch of nerves in the build-up to his first experience of the paid ranks, but was delighted with how the evening went.

He said: “It was a great night, really good, I really enjoyed it. I was a little bit worried just before I went in, as I thought, ‘four rounds, pros, what am I going to do?’

“Then I remembered I’ve been training so much for this, so what am I worked up about?

“I knew it was a lot bigger stage than I had been used to, but when I was walking out, it wasn’t any different to the amateur fights, it was just another fight for me.”

One thing that had changed for Udofia was his opponent as he was supposed to up against Hungarian Gabor Balogh until Whiting took his place.

The 27-year-old had a record of two wins and four defeats from his six previous fights and Udofia was happy with the upgrade as he continued: “I was meant to fight Gabor but he pulled out of the fight about two days before and they got me a late replacement.

“This guy wasn’t a joke, he was quite good, he’s better than a journeyman, and was meant to be a prospect but kind of went away from it, so he was a hard fight.

“I’m happy with that as I was wanted to get a hard test.

“I wanted harder competition and was really happy that my coaches made it possible.”

On the fight itself too, Udofia was glad it lasted the distance to prove all his previous training had been worth it.

He said: “In the first I didn’t really throw any punches, but the next few rounds I came on stronger.

“My coach was really happy that I didn’t come out and try and blast him out and get ahead.

“That can happen when you get nervous and there was a lot of pressure on me, so I could have easily just tried to blast him out, and that wouldn’t have gone anywhere.

“I felt like it was a really good, controlled debut and that’s what I wanted.

“I really wanted to enjoy it and go through all the rounds, I didn’t want to come out and blast someone out in a minute as I’d been training 13 weeks for this.

“I wanted all the minutes, wanted all the rounds.

“I felt really fresh, I wasn’t even blowing at the end, so I know I can go for a lot more rounds.”

Udofia is now hoping to be out again once more in May.