Root and Stokes grind down weary India to stretch lead beyond 100

JOHN COONEY was 28 years old. In other words, he was a young man still within the parameters of his physical prime. Now he is dead.
Climbing into the ring in Belfast on February 2, the super-featherweight Celtic champion had every reason to believe that the future was bright. After all, the popular Northern Irishman’s boxing career was once again in the ascendancy after being out of action for a year with a hand injury, he was engaged to be married to his fiancee Emmaleen, and this defence of his Celtic title against Welshman Nathan Howells, if he came through as he was favoured to, would pave the way for more lucrative opportunities in the sport that he loved.
The cruel vicissitudes of life had a different fate mapped out for him, however, to the extent that a week after losing to Howells by stoppage in the ninth round, Cooney was pronounced dead from a catastrophic head injury at Belfast’s Royal Victoria Hospital. It marks yet another ring fatality and along with it, a shuddering reminder of the inherent dangers of a sport which amounts to organised violence and unarmed combat.

Mary Kom’s fists made history in the boxing world. Malak Mesleh’s never got the chance. One story ends in glory, the other in grief — but both highlight the defiance of women who dare to fight, writes JOHN WIGHT

The Khelif gender row shows no sign of being resolved to the satisfaction of anyone involved anytime soon, says boxing writer JOHN WIGHT

When Patterson and Liston met in the ring in 1962, it was more than a title bout — it was a collision of two black archetypes shaped by white America’s fears and fantasies, writes JOHN WIGHT

In the land of white supremacy, colonialism and the foul legacy of the KKK, JOHN WIGHT knows that to resist the fascism unleashed by Trump is to do God’s work