The past year has been a topsy-turvy one for The Ring magazine no. 10-ranked junior featherweight Nedal “Skinny” Hussein. The Lebanese-Australian only fought a total of seven rounds in four short-lived contests, and had to withdraw from three fights in the final third of the year due to a string of nagging injuries.
First, he injured his left hand while preparing for a contest on the Mundine/Echols WBA 168-pound title fight undercard this past September. Then in October he suffered a nose injury while sparring with young hotshot Benny Cruz. And finally in December, he was brought down by back complications just days before a scheduled bout.
The 26 year old, who has an impressive professional mark of 31-1 (18), has since fully recovered and although he would have loved to fight on another one or two occasions in 2003, he was relatively happy with how proceedings went.
