Five boxers travelled to Portsmouth on Thursday (February 1) to compete in the British University and College Boxing Championships.

On Friday, all five – Jermaine Ellis, Conor Malewicz, Varun Sharma, Daniel Abafor and Henry Page - won their way through to the semi-finals with all-round quality displays of accurate punching, clever footwork and tight defences.

Saturday was semi-finals’ day and there was disappointment for Daniel Abafor as all the other competitors in his category pulled out which meant he could not progress to the finals. In spite of this he cheered his three fellow members as they competed in the semi-finals all of which were close fought contests. One of our boxers, Varun Sharma, lost his bout on a split decision; the other two, Jermaine Ellis and Henry Page won their respective bouts and went through to Sunday’s finals.

Day three - and our two finalists, Jermaine and Henry, had to settle for silver medals in two close, well-matched bouts of quality boxing. This was Henry’s first ever bout which makes his achievement all the more special.

Overall, this was a very exciting weekend and it gave our relatively inexperienced boxers the opportunity to perform at a major championship; their opponents over the three days had boxed at these championships in the previous two years.

A bright future for these young boxers and Exmouth ABC.