Sideline Sid - Sports blogger Sideline Sid is a local sport fanatic. Not only is he a classic rugby bloke but he has views, opinions and knowledge on all sports played in the Bay of Plenty.

While Sidline Sid follows all sports his undoubted passion is boxing. Not the corrupted world of professional boxing, but the amateur game where a myriad of rules and regulations make sure the safety of the boxer is paramount.

This Saturday will provide a rare opportunity for the followers of amateur boxing in the Western Bay to catch some top class action ringside. The occasion is the CNI (Central North Island) Boxing championships to be staged at the QE2 Youth Centre.

Up until recent decades, the Provincial Boxing championships conducted around New Zealand ranked only in stature to the national championships. The perquisite to competing in the New Zealand championships was to annex a provincial title.

While the provincial championships that remain may have fallen in stature, they often have at stake trophies that were first presented in the 1920s and 1930s, when the sport was at its zenith.

Amateur boxing has been around the Western Bay region since the Bay of Plenty Boxing Association was formed in Tauranga in 1921. The Bay of Plenty organisation is likely to have petered out during either the depression or WW2 as a Tauranga Boxing Association was registered in 1946.

A recent conversation at a rugby match revealed one trainer in the late 40s was Tom McCord, who went on to form Tauranga Plumbing. Tom had three passions outside work being rugby, boxing and racehorses. In the 1960s Tom owned a very good open handicapper called Anne Lane.

The rugby conversation revealed that a very good mate of mine called Chris Easterbrook arrived in Tauranga in the early 1950s and trained boxers with a gentleman named Bob Thomas.

My mate Chris is a remarkable person who has always gone at life head on. Now in his 89th year, he still mentors youngsters in boxing skills at Thames High School. He is never happier than when he is engaging in a good natured argument with someone.

Over the years Chris has lived life to the full. Alongside his life membership of New Zealand Rugby League, one of his proudest possessions is his certificate of re-instatement to amateur boxing, after a short stint in professional cycling in the 1930s.

Around the same time that Chris took up the coaching reigns in Tauranga, another local stalwart of the sport got involved in training. Gib Roper, who trained out of the Waimapu sawmill in Greerton, was involved in boxing all his life, after starting out in the squared ring in Taumarunui during the 1930s.

The CNI Association is amongst the strongest in the country, with boxing gyms in the Eastern Bay of Plenty, Tauranga, Rotorua, Tokoroa and Taupo. Numerous National titles in the last three decades, testify to the success of the association formed just over 30 years ago.

One National title that CNI have made their own is the senior Lightweight crown, with 12 titles in 20 years. Amongst the list of CNI lightweight champions is the name of Daryll Leabourn, who annexed the National crown in front of a home crowd at the QE2 stadium in 1991.

To anyone who has an interest in boxing, the two sessions at the QE2 venue on Saturday, could provide plenty of entertainment for a modest entry fee,

Seeya at the Game