Terri Harper reignited her career by outpointing fellow Briton Rhiannon Dixon in Sheffield to become a three-weight world champion.
The 27-year-old controlled the distance and landed accurate counter-punches to win the WBO lightweight crown at the Canon Medical Arena.
Dixon, 29, momentarily hurt Harper in the sixth round but it was an otherwise dominant performance from Doncaster’s Harper.
In a must-win fight, Harper claimed a unanimous decision with scores of 97-93, 97-93 and 96-94.
“That’s the best one of my career. I’ve become a new fighter mentally and physically,” Harper – the light-middleweight and former super-featherweight champion – said.
“There was one point in that fight where I was clocked and I really had to dig deep, but I managed to recover quite quick.”
The previously unbeaten Dixon meanwhile is defeated in the first defence of the title she won in April.
Harper leans on experience in impressive win
Harper had fought in small hall shows at the start of her career and flourished in the more intimate setting.
After a cagey start with neither fighter willing to overcommit, she began to control the distance and land smart counter rights.
Dixon cut a frustrated figure as her jab continuously fell short. “We’ve got to let your hands go,” coach and former world champion Anthony Crolla told her repeatedly in the corner.
The message finally got through when Dixon came out with real intent in the sixth, throwing caution to the wind and hurting Harper with an uppercut and a thudding right.
But Harper – who had been in with the likes of Natasha Jonas, Alycia Baumgardner and Cecilia Braekhus – leaned on her experience to outmanoeuvre her opponent.
She rocked Dixon’s head back with some heavy hits in the closing rounds as blood poured from the champion’s nose.
World-title fight in a small-hall show
A week on from when a record-breaking 96,000 crowd witnessed Daniel Dubois’ triumph over Anthony Joshua at Wembley Stadium, there was fewer than 2,000 fans – and plenty of empty seats – at the community arena for another all-British world-title affair.
It perhaps highlights the progress still to be made in promoting female boxing, and how only a handful of names – such as Katie Taylor and Claressa Shields – appeal to the masses.
The women’s code aside, the investment in boxing by Saudi Arabia organisers has also impacted the magnitude of cards in the United Kingdom, with the biggest ticket-sellers heading to the Middle East.
But Dixon v Harper – originally set to take place as an undercard bout in August at Manchester’s 23,500-capacity Co-op Live Arena – has also been riddled by unfortunate luck with location and date changes after injuries to headline fighters.
“I thought it was a brilliant fight – I’m so glad we kept this show on. [Harper] makes history tonight,” promoter Eddie Hearn said.
He added that Argentina’s IBF champion Beatriz Ferreira could be next in a unification fight for Harper.
Dixon’s reign may have been short-lived, but for a fighter who competed a handful of times on the white-collar scene before turning professional, and just a few years ago was juggling boxing with her day job as a pharmacist, she can hold her head high.
