Peaky Blinders era boxer from Birmingham fought for world title in San Francisco birminghammail.co.uk - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from birminghammail.co.uk Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Norman Giller is an esteemed author of 114 books, he worked as Muhammad Ali’s European publicist, he was a scriptwriter on This Is Your Life and he was a chief sports writer at The Express. But some of his fondest memories originated from his spell as a Boxing News reporter. He spoke to Alex Daley
Should a referee score a fight?
Simon Euan Smith examines the issue of whether a referee is in the best place to judge a fight
IN his editorial last year, “The Bog of Eternal Stench” (BN October 22), discussing the problems in scoring bouts, Matt Christie wrote: “An eternal debate is the issue of point of view. Who really has the best view?” My mind went back to 1968, when I attended a “Boxing Brains Trust,” chaired by former BN editor Gilbert Odd. From the audience I asked the panel (which included British and Commonwealth bantam champion Alan Rudkin) their views on the relative merits of referee only or referee plus judges. Gilbert had no doubts – the referee moves around the ring, whereas a judge is watching from one fixed position. At the time, major bouts in Britain couldn’t be televised “live,” and Gilbert said: “You go to a fight, then watch it on TV the next night – it’s a different fight.” He was strongly in favour of “referee only.”