Sharp fin-ish for Ennis Shark

There was blood in the water and on the canvas last Saturday night as Phoenix Kickboxing Club’s Mark ‘The Shark’ Duffy lived up to his killer nickname at  Ultimate Rising in Galway, with an impressive TKO win over local fighter Martin Greaney.
Taking the fight on just a week’s notice, the lanky light heavyweight faced a stern challenge in Greaney, who is trained by WKN world middleweight champion Ken Horan but showed scant regard for his opponent’s pedigree.
In his first bout under the Phoenix Kickboxing banner, Duffy weighed in at a lean 78.9kg, taking a very slight weight advantage over Greaney.
It was all forward motion from the start for The Shark, who flew out of his corner for the first round throwing lunging front-snap kicks and following up with heavy punches.
Making good use of his reach, Greaney was on the back foot from the off and Duffy was landing early and often in the initial exchanges.
The Phoenix fighter was unlucky not to have stopped the fight with just a minute on the clock when he forced the Galway fighter into the first of two standing counts as the result of a turning kick that caught his opponent square on the side of his head. Greaney shook off the fog only to face the count again before the end of the round, this time compliments of a devastating combination of hooks, uppercuts and straight rights that left him reeling.
As the second round began at the Claregalway Hotel, a more cynical or work-shy fighter may have sat back on the sort of lead Duffy had amassed, safe in the knowledge that they could coast to an easy decision win. With the whiff of a decisive finish in the air, however, The Shark continued to press the action.
Greaney weathered an early flurry that would have had lesser fighters hitting the deck and caught Duffy with a thumping body shot. The blow seemed to chum the waters for the The Shark.
With barely a minute gone in the second round he unleashed a barrage of punches, sending his opponent into the ropes and causing his hands to drop. This one mistake was immediately punished with a looping crescent kick that caught Greaney right on the chin and sent him crashing to the canvas – a thrilling end to a imperious performance from Duffy.