Ramla Ali makes history. It’s what she does. The 32-year-old unbeaten featherweight became the first Somali boxer to compete at the Olympics, at Tokyo 2020. When Ali turned over into the paid ranks in October 2020, she became the first female Somali boxer to turn professional. Now the boxer, model and activist is preparing to compete in the first women’s boxing match ever to take place in Saudi Arabia. When she meets former world title challenger Crystal Garcia Nova on the undercard of Oleksandr Usyk’s rematch with Anthony Joshua, she will be breaking new ground once again.
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Ali understands the weight of this trip, speaking to Sky Sports the 5-0 fighter said, "We will cement our names and it will be there forever, and I know along the way we'll be inspiring so many young girls and women to not only take up the sport of boxing but take up sport in general."
Such a step is no small matter in a country like Saudi Arabia. Notoriously prohibitive to women, the country is only just allowing females to compete in sport. 2019 saw the first ever women’s wrestling match take place in the nation, when WWE staged a bout between Natalya and Lacey Evans.
Ali will be doing her part to ensure the women of Saudi Arabia can see a pathway into sporting competition. She will be hosting a boxing class in the country expected to be attended by between 30 and 40 women. It is just the latest progressive and forward-thinking move for Ali, who puts social justice at the heart of much of what she does in and out of the ring.
Ali founded a charitable initiative called The Sisters Club that teaches boxing to young Muslim women and provides self-defence classes for those suffering from sexual abuse. She gave 25% of her first-year earnings as a professional to Black Lives Matter. The star fled Mogadishu as a child when the Somali Civil War broke out. Her brother was killed by a mortar when he was just 12 years old. Ramla Ali has experienced true hardship and has worked tirelessly to make the world a better place ever since.
Alongside her ring career and her charitable efforts, Ali has made waves in the modelling world. The Somali superstar has featured on the covers of British Vogue, ELLE, Wonderland and Grazia among many other worldwide publications. Another string to the bow of one of modern boxing’s renaissance fighters.
The stage is now set for Ali to fight in front of her biggest global audience yet. She competes in a history-making fight on the undercard of the heavyweight championship of the world. This is a deserved career pinnacle for one of boxing’s most compassionate, fascinating and talented characters.
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