Australian welterweight Steve Gago (14-2, 7 KOs) will get the opportunity to showcase his skills on the national stage when he takes on Blake Minto (15-6-2, 4 KOs) over 10 rounds at the HBF Arena Venture to Perth, Western Australia. on September 7.
The 35-year-old southpaw will box on the undercard of Thammanoon Niyomtrong’s WBA strawweight title defense against Alex Winwood, with the entire program to be broadcast live and free on 7plus as part of the Premier Boxing series.
Perth hosted the IBF lightweight title fight between Vasiliy Lomachenko and George Kambosos Jr in May, but before that the Western Australian capital had been largely devoid of major boxing events dating back to the veiled days of Danny Green.
Unlike the Lomachenko-Kambosos card, the Niyomtrong-Winwood show, which is co-promoted by Green Machine Promotions and Dragon Fire Boxing, is full of West Australian talent.
Gago is proud to be part of it.
“It’s a really good card,” Gago told The Ring. “It hasn’t been like this for a long time. We haven’t had a good fight card like this in Perth since Lomachenko and Kambosos, so good for Perth. This gets the whole crowd going after the local boxers again. It’s going to be an awesome night. And to see Alex fight for his world title, I reckon it’s going to be fantastic.
“The boxing scene over here hasn’t been this great since the Danny Green days. Danny put Perth back on the map and now he’s found a great way to make it happen again.
Steve Gago – Photo courtesy of Dragon Fire Boxing
“After the whole Loma card here, it really just shows that Perth is a great city to fight in. Let’s get the action back here.”
Hailing from Toronto, just south of Newcastle in New South Wales, Minto may have a few losses on his record, but he has mixed in good company and has only been stopped once. Gago believes he has the perfect style to bring out the best in him.
“I saw some footage of him last night and he was fighting some famous people,” Gago said. “He is also durable. He likes to come forward, he can hit, he likes to throw combos, so he actually moves alright. I think it’s an exciting fight. I haven’t had an exciting fight like this in a long time. I’m pretty excited and I can’t wait to see how we go. I reckon it will be a cracker of a fight.”
Gago has now won two straight fights since dropping a 10-round unanimous decision to reigning IBF junior welterweight titleholder Liam Paro three years ago. Gago, who hasn’t made the 140-pound weight limit since his second pro bout, suffered a serious injury early in the Paro fight but still managed to hang on until the final bell.
“I actually had three bulging discs,” Gago said. “It all happened from, I think, round three. I continued the fight, but I think you can probably see in the corner that I said, ‘I think you can see something is seriously wrong.’ Every time I moved on my front foot, there was a sharp, shooting pain that ran up and down my spine, and I knew it was something serious. I’ve never felt anything like it.”
Boxing on pure guts and adrenaline, it wasn’t until he got back to his hotel room that the seriousness of the injury really dawned.
“You could definitely tell from my movement and the volume of my punches from round one to round four or five and beyond that I couldn’t really do anything,” Gago said. “The only punch I could actually throw without hurting my back was the jumping hook, or the gazelle hook. It took some pressure off my back. Anything after that just killed me.
“After the fight, when I was back at the hotel and cooled off, I was busy injecting painkillers, trying to sleep, trying to get up, trying to pack, then we went straight to the airport, all during COVID. It was crazy.”
Now fully healed, Gago is committed to making a run at a world title shot and the first step is defeating Minto. The WBC is the preferred route, where San Antonio’s Mario Barrios (29-2, 18 KOs) holds the belt.
“I hope to make the top 25, maybe even the top 15 in the WBC, and then break back into the international fights,” said Gago, who is currently ranked 37th by the Mexico-based sanctioning body.
“I would love to fight in Japan and eventually progress quickly, hopefully to a world title shot. That would be great. WBC looks good to me; I’m on the right track, so the main goal is to break into the top 15, top 25, and then see what we can do from there.”
