{"id":86999,"date":"2021-06-18T03:25:16","date_gmt":"2021-06-18T03:25:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=86999"},"modified":"2021-06-18T04:03:35","modified_gmt":"2021-06-18T04:03:35","slug":"10-million-nrl-star-to-follow-gallen-into-boxing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=86999","title":{"rendered":"$10 million NRL star to follow Gallen into boxing"},"content":{"rendered":"

Boxing promoter Dean Lonergan has called on Paul Gallen<\/a> not to take up a rematch with Justis Huni with the Australian champ<\/a> set to hold his next fight after the Olympics on an 'All Stars' fight night, that will include a boxing debut for Cowboys megastar Jason Taumalolo, in October.<\/p>\n

Gallen signed a two-fight deal with Lonergan and was due to face off with Huni again after his Tokyo campaign but the promoter doesn't think Gallen should put his health at risk against the 22-year-old. Lonergan added that if Gallen pushed the issue he would honour the contract.<\/p>\n

"We will honour our contract with Gal if he wants to go again but all he's going to do is get hurt," Lonergan told Wide World of Sports.<\/p>\n

"If he turns around in a month's time and says he wants to, at the end of the day we will honour our contract.<\/p>\n

\"Huni<\/p>\n

"He took a huge beating on Wednesday night and I personally don't want to see him go through that again because I have immense respect for the guy and I like him.<\/p>\n

"He might want to fight again but under no circumstances should he fight Justis Huni again because the beating will be worse."<\/p>\n

Lonergan is now in discussions with the team of New Zealand giant Junior Fa who stands at two-metres tall and holds a record of 19-1.<\/p>\n

Fa's only loss has come against world ranked Joseph Parker via decision earlier this year and Lonergan claims a fight against the Kiwi giant will accelerate Huni's career by two years.<\/p>\n

If all goes to plan Huni will take on Fa in October, the same week the Rugby League World Cup is set to kick-off.<\/p>\n

\"Jason<\/p>\n

Four NRL players have been confirmed for the fight night – Jason Taumalolo, Brandon Smith, Addin Fonua Blake and Junior Paulo – and Lonergan claims more will be named in the coming months.<\/p>\n

While the Rugby League World Cup, due to be played in England, is still under a cloud, Lonergan claims players involved will fight before they are due to depart for the tournament if it in fact goes ahead. <\/p>\n

Lonergan is pushing ahead aggressively with the footy fight night despite the fact that NRL boss Peter V'landys today told 2GB's Ben Fordham that contracted players "shouldn't be doing it"<\/a>.<\/p>\n

He said Taumalolo is using Gallen's career as a blueprint to forge his path into boxing.<\/p>\n

"Tauamlolo has signed a two-fight deal and wants to follow in Gallen's footsteps and become a professional fighter at the back end of his career," Lonergan said. "I'm in discussion with his manager to do a co-promotional deal with them."<\/p>\n

Earlier this year the All Stars Fight Night took place in Townsville, featuring current players such as Junior Paulo and Josh Papalii along with a host of other active players.<\/p>\n

For a daily dose of the best of the breaking news and exclusive content from Wide World of Sports, subscribe to our newsletter by<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0clicking here!<\/em><\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Boxing promoter Dean Lonergan has called on Paul Gallen not to take up a rematch with Justis Huni with the Australian champ set to hold […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86999"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=86999"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86999\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":87001,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86999\/revisions\/87001"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=86999"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=86999"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=86999"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}