Justis Huni storms to Australian heavyweight title on destructive professional debut

Justis Huni won the Australian heavyweight title on his professional debut to send an ominous warning through boxing’s top division.

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The 21-year-old forced defending champion Faiga Opelu's corner to throw in the towel in the seventh round of their fight on Thursday in Brisbane.

Huni was among the gold medal favourites for the Tokyo Olympics but, when they were postponed, he instead turned pro and set his sights on making history by winning a national title in his first fight.

"My dream in the professional ranks is to unify all the belts," Huni said.

"That's all I want to do - unify all the belts and hopefully tick that off before I'm 30-years-old and then live the rest of my life.

"I want to put the Australian heavyweight division on the map."

'Huni can win a world title as quick as AJ'

His promoter Dean Lonergan told Sky Sports: "[Huni] wants to do historic things, hence we're fighting for the Australian title in the first fight out over 10 rounds. It's never been done before.

"We aim to move him at lightning speed.

"Anthony Joshua managed to get the heavyweight title in 16 fights.

"With the right fights and starting out this way, I think that is potentially doable. I know that's something that's certainly on their radar.

"Do we think we can do it faster? The answer is - we're certainly going to have a crack."

'I want to be world champion quickly'

Huni told Sky Sports: "That was the goal with my promoter, to take the fastest route to a world title fight.

"We're really just looking at knocking out all the fighters here in Australia and then going worldwide after that.

"It will be amazing to have an Australian world champion. We've had Lucas Browne. But it would be good to have an Australian heavyweight that's up on the top of the rankings in the world. It would be very good.

"That's definitely my dream to have a heavyweight world title fight come here in my own backyard. That would be amazing."

Sky Sports schedule

Usyk vs Chisora - Oct 31, live on Sky Sports Box Office
Oleksandr Usyk vs Derek Chisora
Savannah Marshall vs Hannah Rankin
Lee Selby vs George Kambosos Jr
Dave Allen
Tommy McCarthy vs Bilal Laggoune
Amy Timlin vs Carly Skelly

Taylor vs Gutierrez - Nov 14, live on Sky Sports
Katie Taylor vs Miriam Gutierrez
Terri Harper vs Katharina Thanderz
Rachel Ball vs Ebanie Bridges
Jamie Cox vs Jack Cullen
John Docherty vs Jack Arnfield
Thomas Whittaker-Hart

Povetkin vs Whyte 2 - Nov 21, live on Sky Sports Box Office
Alexander Povetkin vs Dillian Whyte
Conor Benn vs Sebastian Formella
Chris Billam-Smith vs Deion Jumah

Joshua vs Pulev - Dec 12, live on Sky Sports Box Office
Anthony Joshua vs Kubrat Pulev