Ringside Report: Terri Harper Shines in Sheffield

Ringside Report: Terri Harper Shines in Sheffield

As good as Terri Harper looked last night in Sheffield, I don’t think we have yet scratched the surface of just how good she will eventually become.

Still a relative novice, Harper will improve further, and that must be a frightening prospect for her future opponents.

Harper was a big winner on the scorecards, but I felt she could have won it even easier. She had the range and the skills to win at a virtual canter, but perhaps due to her over-eagerness to get a stoppage and the bravery of her opponent, large portions of the fight was fought at close range.

There were some wild exchanges, and Harper was putting herself in unnecessary danger at times. Eva Wahlstrom didn’t let go of her version of the world super-featherweight without one hell of an effort.

Wahlstrom, the vastly more experienced of the two, made Harper work extremely hard for her 10th win in the paid ranks, and it was the sort of test Harper needed.

Scores of 98-91 and 99-90 twice reflect accurately what we saw, but at the same time didn’t really show the contribution Wahlstrom made to the excellent contest.

Harper came in with a ton of hype around her, but this was by far her toughest test, and she there is no doubt she passed it with flying colours.

There have been false starts with women’s boxing before, but finally we are seeing it get a real push, fights like this and with an atmosphere to match, will keep the momentum going.

Harper added the WBC super-featherweight title to her IBO version of the world title, judging her from performance against Wahlstrom, more belts will undoubtedly follow.