The exceptional story of the Olympic boxer whose hometown has been shaken by Tommy Robinson and Donald Trump – and why she’s already a winner, writes IAN HERBERT

Just when the fight against propagators of racist hate seems that much harder, a young boxer’s appearance in a bout at the Albert Hall on Friday will offer evidence that sport can shine a light in dark times.

She’s Cindy Ngamba, an Olympic fighter I first wrote about here last summer. Her home town, Bolton, was being shaken to its core by disorder whipped up in the aftermath of the Southport killings, by Tommy Robinson, the racist influencer currently being legitimised by Elon Musk, JD Vance and others in the lunatic Trump administration.

Ngamba was on her way to becoming the first member of the Refugee Olympic Team ever to medal, at the time. As Robinson did his damnedest to sow division, she offered a different story about what those arriving here from other countries can bring to communities, and how people can co-exist.

She’s 25 now, but was ten when she left the Cameroonian coastal city of Douala, with her elder brother, to live with their father here. With limited English, she struggled for a time and eventually flourished because of a thirst for knowledge, a work ethic and a love of her sport, nurtured at the Elite boxing gym which is set among Bolton’s terraces.

I visited that gym a few months back and met coach Alex Matienko, a hardened boxing man who’s been running the place for 20 years and yet recalled few who’d made an impact on local kids quite like Ngamba. ‘We’re a working-class sport in a working-class town and people around here take some convincing,’ he told me. ‘But a lot of fighters have looked up to Cindy. She’s inspired a lot of people.’

The gym’s attempts to screen Ngamba’s Olympic bouts became caught up in last summer’s racial flashpoints. Police had asked people to avoid a major thoroughfare which was a route to the gym for many – Chorley New Road – because of the risk of potential flashpoints. The screenings continued regardless, attracting 100 people. All colours. All creeds.

Cindy Ngamba made history when she won the first medal for the Refugee Olympic Team

Her stunning performance in Paris came against the backdrop of discord in her hometown of Bolton, stirred by far-right agitator Tommy Robinson

Ngamba’s dramatic rise to the greatest sporting stage came after suffering difficult early years

Ngamba tells me that she was oblivious to the violence while out in Paris. ‘If you’d told me that there was this kind of trouble at home, I wouldn’t have believed you, because that’s not my Bolton,’ she says. ‘We get on together here. It’s why I love the place.’

In many ways, her story resembles that of Mo Farah, four-times British Olympic gold medallist, who also arrived in Britain as a child, and found purpose through sport after difficult early years.

But while Farah, who was trafficked here from Djibouti, had a documented legal identity within these shores, Ngamba reached adolescence to find that she did not. It’s why, despite being part of the elite set-up at GB Boxing, who’ve supported her hugely, she had to compete under the Refugee Team flag in Paris.

‘As a child, you’re more bothered about making friends, adapting to the lifestyle, learning the language, being a teenager, than things like that,’ she tells me. ‘It was when I left school and was going to college that I started thinking about my identity.

‘Your friends tell you that they’re going to this country and that country and ask you where you’re going. And I’m, like, “Staying in Bolton.” And then you learn about holidays and how you need a passport for them. Then you learn you’re still an immigrant and can be kicked out at any time.’

She made the most out of staying put – progressing from college to graduate from Bolton University with a BA in Crime and Criminal Justice. She fitted in training at the Elite gym around a working life which entailed catching a bus from Bolton to Bury, taking a second bus on to Burnley, then opening out a fold-up bike and cycling to the Boohoo warehouse to work night shifts, shifting boxes. A six-hour round trip across Lancashire.

None of this counted when, after reporting to one of the dozens of weekly appointments she has kept at Manchester’s immigration office to attest to her whereabouts, she was detained, driven to a deportation centre in south east England in a windowless van and faced the threat of deportation back to West Africa.

She received a last-minute reprieve, partially on grounds that she had arrived as a minor and her family were here, and was subsequently granted official leave to remain. Her application for British citizenship began then, though it is still years away from being granted. Olympic achievements like last summer’s do not speed the process.

Unlike Sir Mo Farah, Ngamba learned in adolescence that she had no legal identity in the UK

The 25-year-old continued her education and earned a BA while working and training in Bolton

The newly minted professional fighter is looking ahead to her first fight at the Albert Hall

Ngamba was invited to turn pro on the back of her performances in Paris, and on Friday will compete in her first professional bout in one the most prestigious British venues of them all.

‘I’m not rich,’ she tells me. ‘I can’t create a Foundation for myself. But now I can go to a school or a youth club and bring my medal with me when I speak, which is important – because let me tell you, you need evidence when you speak to kids these days. I’m someone who can say “I come from Bolton. I struggled for a time, but I worked hard, stayed disciplined, and was able to go to the Olympics.” I tell them: “You can be next.”’

Her fight on Friday, televised on Sky, will take her up against Kirstie Bavington, the former European welterweight champion, and there’s already talk of her going forward to fight the US’s Claressa Shields. More significantly, her story shreds the lazy propaganda of intellectually challenged bigots like Robinson. For that, the people of Bolton will tell you, she’s already a winner.