World champion kickboxer Marlon Hunt is hoping his son Marshal could go on to be even better than him after the seven-year-old was selected to contest an English junior title next February.

Stuart Watson

By Stuart Watson

World champion kickboxer Marlon Hunt is hoping his son Marshal could go on to be even better than him after the seven-year-old was selected to contest an English junior title next February.

Hunt, who is currently ranked at number five in the world, started up his Red Phoenix Kickboxing Academy in Great Finborough at the start of this year.

Since then his junior training sessions have proved extremely popular and, at a recent show organised by Hunt at Stowmarket, he put forward his best young talent to compete.

A tape of that competition was then sent around the country's top promoters and Hunt was soon contacted to see if a number of his young fighters, including his young son Marshal, would compete for top junior titles early next year.

Hunt said: “I was held back from competitions when I first started kickboxing. I was promised this and that by old instructor but nothing ever came of it until I met my current instructor Richard Stephens at a later date.

“I want my top pupils to get on the circuit early. I believe you have got to be 100% behind your students and travel with them all round Britain to get them recognised.

“I said to them, if you are really interested in this and want to compete, I will get you on these shows and I will get you these titles. I promised them title shots within a year and it has happened.

“You have to push them out there I think. It's OK being the nest in your area, but if you really want to be the best you have to go out there and really try and prove it.

“With Marshal, hopefully he can now go on and be even better than me now he has started so early. Within three or four years he could be a junior world champion.

“I'm quite a chilled out dad, but you can definitely see that he's got the fighting side of things when he is training.

“It's totally non contact at such a young age, more like sparring, everything is very safe. They wear head guards and have full protection from highly qualified judges.

“I first started this club because there was nothing for these kids to do around this area. Finborough is a little bit out of the way and the kids were just hanging around the parks.”