John Green-Darren Reay: Great Northern Area title clash in prospect

Northern Area title fights are like Stagecoach/ Arriva/ Go North East buses. You wait forever for one and two come at once.

Other bus companies are available by the way.

But, getting back to the story, how nice to see that Northern Area belts will be contested for the first time since 2017 – not once but twice in 2019.

There will be an A66 affair at the Summer Rumble on Sunday, July 14 when Redcar’s Tom ‘One Bomb’ Hill meets Darlington’s Ellis Corrie for the welterweight belt ahead of a fascinating match between another Teessider, John Green, and Northumberland’s Darren Reay, part of MTK’S in-form Gateshead stable.

Green and Reay both won in Newcastle on Friday night and won well on the MTK show, John (pictured) defeating Tamworth’s Josh Baillie and Darren beating Eligio Palacios, the Spain-based Nicaraguan.

Reay is looking better by the fight and is unbeaten in five professional appearances while Green, also 29, has won all three of his bouts since coming back after three years out of the ring.

Before leaving the fight scene in 2015, Green won the Northern Area title with an excellent win over Peter Cope at the Stadium of Light, avenging a NAT loss to the Hartlepool southpaw the previous year.

Trained by Pete Shepperson in Darlington, Green is in terrific touch, much to the delight of his manager, Steve Wraith.

“I’m proud of him,” said the Geordie fight figure. “It’s great to see him blossom and put on performances that the fans love.

“He’s got a good following, he’s an entertaining fighter and I think we’re seeing the best of him under Pete.

“I know the Joe Laws fans packed out the Newcastle Eagles Arena on Friday night but I thought John’s fans were great and you could hear the ‘T-T-Teessiders’ chant loud and proud.

“This is going to be a fantastic fight between John and Darren.”

The rivals faced off in the ring after their wins on Friday night and it was all respectful stuff, there was no pushing, shoving, name-calling, which is a lesson to some of the big-names out there.

“It’s a big fight, a 50-50 fight. And it’s great to see it get sorted,” added Wraith. “I like Darren and get on with him, I have a lot of time and respect for him.

“We’ve seen some great Northern Area title fights and I think this will live up to them.

“North-East fighters have taken each other on before, perhaps not as often as should happen and we saw two crackers last year between Jay Hughes and Kris Pilkington and Greg O’Neil against Richie O’Neill. Neither, sadly, were Northern Area title fights, but Green-Reay is and could be a bit of a war.

“It should happen September or October and we can’t wait.”

Words: Roy Kelly