By Dan Cotter

Nottingham’s very own Jason Booth defends his British super-bantamweight title in his hometown on Friday night against Matthew Marsh (who vacated the title 2 years ago due to weight struggles) at the Harvey Hadden Centre. 

‘2 Smooth’ Booth is enjoying a terrific run of performances and his career has been revitalised despite being old for a super-bantamweight - Booth is 32.  Booth defeated Mark Moran in April last year by a sixth round stoppage to claim the British crown and he will retain the Lonsdale belt outright if successful in defending his title on Friday.

Rendall Munroe, a close friend of Booth’s, will be keeping an eye on proceedings, as he is the current European champion.  Although both fighters have expressed a desire to stay away from duelling with one another they are both promoted by Frank Maloney and if it were to happen it would be a superb East-Midlands derby.

Booth, however, has a job to do this forthcoming Friday; he enjoyed a cracking 2009 defeating Rocky Dean over the distance and forcing veteran Michael Hunter to retire on his stool in the 5th.  Booth has found a new home at the 121 limit after having a very successful career in other weight categories.

Jason managed to get two European flyweight title shots against Alexander Makhmutov and Mimoun Chent.  Though his biggest accomplishment of his career came when capturing the IBO super flyweight title, which he won by defeating Lunga Ntontela on a split decision despite being knocked down in the seventh stanza.

Booth managed to defend his title successfully against Dale Robinson before losing to Damaen Kelly and subsequently took a two-year hiatus from the ring to overcome his demons and tackle his much-written about problems with alcohol, which not only threatened his career but also his very existence.

The challenger, Marsh, has had a relatively slow career, fighting 14 times, 13-1 (1), in 6 years; however, with two fights at the back end of 2009 the West Ham-based fighter will be hoping he has the tools to rain on Booth’s parade.  Marsh is also on a winning streak, defeating some recognisable names such as Rocky Dean and Esham Pickering.

Booth will be enormously confident and his run of form suggests he is likely to come out the victor on Friday night, neither men have particularly high knock out percentages with Marsh only scoring one KO in his career (Ajibu Salum).  Marsh, though, will be eager to prove that he is a force to be reckoned with in the super-bantamweight division.  On paper it looks likely to go to the scorecards, however with the spectacular run Booth has been on recently expect Booth to apply early pressure, leaving Marsh battling in the trenches should he make it to the latter rounds.

The undercard also includes an elimination bout for a place in the Prizefighter light-middleweight tournament between Martin Concepcion and Kevin Hammond.  The winner of the bout will join the other 7 contenders on the 26th February at York Hall in Bethnal Green.

Carl Johanneson makes his return to the ring after an almost two-year lay–off, his last contest was that memorable defeat to Kevin Mitchell in an enthralling super-featherweight British title fight; Carl takes on Youssef Al Hamidi on Friday.  Young Mutley fights Scott Woolford and light heavyweight Prizefighter winner Ovil McKenzie fights Billy Boyle.  Tony Jeffries was scheduled to fight Nathan King, but the light heavyweight ‘Mackem’ has had to pull out due to a hand injury sustained in training. 

Frank Maloney promotes and Sky Sports 1 and HD1 televise from 10pm tomorrow night.