STOCKBRIDGE ABC, a community-centred gym in the proud fighting city of Liverpool, England, was forced to close its doors on May 2.
After receiving an eviction notice from Knowsley Town Council – giving it just two days to remove every piece of equipment from the building – the amateur boxing club had no choice but to pack its bags and move out.
As a result, head coach Sam Walmsley took to social media in a bid to amplify the support for Stockbridge, a gym where the likes of Tony Bellew and Rocky Fielding once plied their trade.
And while platforms such as Twitter remain, for the most part, a cesspit for negativity, they can also be used as powerful tools for the greater good.
Sure enough, the past 24 hours or so have shown that much to be true, with the British boxing community, this time around, coming together for all the right reasons.
“I can’t believe how much it’s blown up, to be honest,” Walmsley told Boxing News. “The fact that people are sharing it [on social media], and are outraged – rightfully so – hopefully that will put pressure on the council.
“This is my whole tactic – to apply that much pressure that [the council has] either got to admit their actual motivations, or they’ve got to change something.”
Even before Walmsley began coaching at the gym, which was around two years ago, Stockbridge’s relationship with the council was far from straightforward.
With a plethora of restrictions already in place, the devastating news of its eviction arrived not so much as a shock but, as Walmsley wrote on social media, the final ‘nail in the coffin.’
Given that, while operating in a multi-purpose building, he is only afforded one-hour slots, Walmsley has, much to his credit, often taken on multiple sessions at a time.
So now, with the gym’s immediate future hanging in the balance, his desire to reverse the council’s decision cannot be questioned.
“The email we received [on April 30] started off by accusing us of subletting [the building], which is a bare-faced lie and was proven to be so,” Walmsley added.
“Then it said there was a fire hazard from our equipment being there, but we’ve had an independent fire assessment done to disprove that as well.
“Because we’ve had trouble with the council for the past five years at least, probably going back longer, we’re very restricted on how much equipment we can have.
“The other thing [the email] said was that the bags hanging on the beams could be causing structural damage, but those bags have been hanging on the same beams for 40 years.
“We also refurbished the building in 2018, and installed more structural pillars.
“[The council] won’t show us the structural survey they’ve had done to prove that the bags are causing problems. But again, it’s quite hard to believe.
“And then the fourth thing [in the email] was that we don’t have insurance. We obviously then sent them the insurance that we do have, and have had all along.
“But as long as I’m there, as an England Boxing coach, we’re also insured under England Boxing with anything that happens in sparring.”
In a more encouraging turn of events, Stockbridge posted on Instagram this morning a statement reading:
“Thanks to your outpouring of support and public pressure, we’re now seeing early signs of progress in our fight to keep the club alive. The council has agreed to a meeting.”
In the meantime, while the council – still nebulous in its reasoning – considers its decision to evict Stockbridge, the gym’s boxers are nonetheless left without a place to train.
“We’ve got a boxer who’s preparing for their England Boxing assessment, others who’re preparing for Haringey [Box Cup], and as far as they’re concerned, they’ve got nowhere to train,” Walmsley said.
“As a short-term fix, I’m speaking to other clubs now, just so that, for whatever hours they can give us, we’ll have somewhere to train.”
Boxing News reached out to Knowsley Town Council for a comment, but it was unable to provide one at this moment in time.
