Boxing is filled with examples of boxers who started their careers off well, but then everything unravelled once they lost for the first time. 30-year-old Frenchman Mickael Lacombe could easily have become one of these examples, but instead he is now set to fight for his first professional championship.
Lacombe won his first two paid bouts in 2011, but then lost for the first time in January of 2012. He rebounded with two more victories, before everything went downhill fast for him. A No-Decision fight was followed by four straight defeats, and his future in the ring looked very bleak when he was knocked out in the first round by Morgan Ndong Zue.
Most boxers with ambitions of being more than just an opponent for the sports prospects, would have looked for another career. But Lacombe refused to give up, and between April 2014 and April 2016 he put together a string of five victories to take his record to 9-5 (4).
On Saturday, March 18, he will headline a show in his home-town Montceau, fighting for the vacant World Boxing Federation (WBF) Eurasia Welterweight title against Georgian Anzor Gamgebeli, who, with four previous title fights, is far more experienced and brings a 32-18-3 (16) record.
Should Lacombe be victorious, he will be living proof that its not a question of how bad you start, but rather a question of how well you finish. Not that winning the WBF Eurasia title will be the end of him, as it could easily lead to even bigger opportunities.
