Tall Leeds southpaw Hopey Price extended his unbeaten record to five fights against Italy’s game but limited Claudio Grande and sealed the show by dropping him with the last punch of the fight, the final Fight Camp show of 2021 in Essex. 

Price is huge for a super-bantamweight, which provides obvious problems for come-forward fighters like Grande, who have to walk through shots to have any hope of landing their own. 

The 21-year-old generally controlled the action on the outside, spearing Grande with shots as he stepped in. Grande, who was unbeaten in five going into the fight, had some success in the third round as he trapped Price on the ropes and opened up, but when Price got some room to work, Grande couldn’t get near him.  

Grande made Price work for it in the second half, but if there had been any doubt about who would win, Price ended that as he dropped Grande on his back with a jolting left hook just after the ten-second warning at the end of the sixth and final round. Grande made it to his feet at six but the bell had gone. 

Referee Mark Bates scored it 58-55 for Price. 

Kash Farooq won his third fight under the Matchroom banner, winning the WBC international bantamweight belt with a one-sided unanimous decision over Mexico’s Luis Gerardo Castillo. 

Farooq was happy to engage with the Mexican but his speed and head movement meant he dominated from start to finish. Only one judge, Mark Lyson, gave Castillo the share of one round, scoring it 100-91, the other two Braham Ait Aadi and Christophe Fernandez had it a shutout, 100-90. 

Raymond Ford, from New Jersey, moved to 9-0 with one draw as he stopped the once-promising Reece Bellotti in the third round.  

Bellotti, 30 was once Commonwealth featherweight champion and 12-0 as a pro, but he has now lost five of his last seven fights. He began well enough and matched Ford through the first round, but as Ford went through the gears, Bellotti could not go with him. 

The American began the third round with a blistering two-fisted attack, rocking Bellotti repeatedly until referee Michael Alexander stepped in at 0:39 of the round. 

Zelfra Barrett kept busy with a four-round win over Viorel Simion in the off-TV opener. Barrett dropped the Romanian in the first round with a body shot and kept on top until Simion was pulled out at the end of the fourth round.