Tokyo Olympian Kurt Walker couldn’t have done more in his professional debut as the Northern Irishman stopped Jaroslav Hriadel, of the Czech Republic, with a body shot in the first round of a featherweight four-rounder on the Taylor-Catterall undercard in Glasgow. 

Hriadel was well out of his depth and could not stop Walker’s right hand as he landed to head and body at will. But it was a left hook to the body that did for Hriadel as it dropped him in obvious pain. Hriadel beat the count at nine, but referee Darren Maxwell waved it off. 

Kieran Molloy wasted little time on his professional debut as he stopped Spain’s Damian Esquisabel in the second round of their super-welterweight four-rounder. 

Formerly a useful Irish amateur Molloy, who has based himself as a pro in Loughborough, kept Esquisabel under pressure for the first round and when he trapped him in a corner early in the second, referee Kevin McIntyre stepped in to stop it. The stoppage looked a little premature, but Esquisabel was doing little. The official time was 33 seconds of the second round. 

Once a super-lightweight, Belgium’s Erik Nazaryan, at 37, is now plying his trade at 207 pounds, which was generously billed at cruiserweight.  

Unsurprisingly, Edinburgh debutant Scott Forrest towered over him and kept him on the end of his jab and a clubbing right in the first round (of a scheduled six). Nazaryan came forward a but more the second, but midway, through the round, Nazaryan indicated that he had injured his right hand or wrist and referee McIntyre waved it off. The time was 1:08. 

Bilal Fawaz moved to 2-0 as a professional as he stopped Malam Varela in the third of a middleweight six-rounder. 

Fawaz is originally from Nigeria but was trafficked to London as a child where he was forced to work and only recently won a battle against extradition to Nigeria, where he was not even a citizen. He was always on top, but tended to be too open at times, as he was caught by Varela’s counter. 

Varela, who is originally from Portugal but boxes out of Manchester, was on the floor in the first as he lunged in but was caught by a left hook. 

The second was competitive, but when Varela was hurt by a solid right in the third, the end was nigh. Varela just stopped throwing back as he went to the ropes and Fawaz gave him a steady working over until referee Maxwell intervened just as the bell sounded to end the third round.  

Ron Lewis is a senior writer for BoxingScene. He was Boxing Correspondent for The Times, where he worked from 2001-2019 - covering four Olympic Games and numerous world title fights across the globe. He has written about boxing for a wide variety of publications worldwide since the 1980s.