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More used to walloping cricket balls than opponents, Andrew Flintoff successfully swapped batting gloves for boxing gloves on Friday night beating American opponent, Richard Dawson in their heavyweight fight at the Manchester Arena, England. Despite being knocked to the floor in the second round, the former England cricketer recovered to win on points (39 to 38) in the four-round bout witnessed by a 5,000-strong crowd which included former teammates Steve Harmison and Rob Key."As a personal achievement, this tops the lot," Flintoff said. "The crowd made a massive difference tonight. I'll appreciate I was sloppy at times, but it was a humbling moment."

Flintoff, who entered the ring wearing the shirt of his county cricket club Lancashire, had the better of the exchanges in the opening round, but was knocked to the canvas by the 23-year-old Dawson during the second. The 34-year-old was quick to recover though and made the referee's count comfortably before going on to dominate the final two rounds and secure the points victory.

Flintoff announced his intentions to start boxing professionally in September and trained with former Irish world featherweight champion Barry McGuigan and his son Shane in preparation for his first fight. But his decision has caused controversy.

British boxing promoter Frank Warren, whose BoxNation channel showed the fight, said in September that it would be "car-crash television," while Frank Maloney, who managed former world heavyweight champion Lennox Lewis, described the bout as "dangerous nonsense." Despite a successful start, Flintoff remains uncertain about his future in the sport saying he will delay a decision until the new year. "I want some time off, have a nice Christmas. After Christmas I will start to decide what to do. It is quite fresh, still quite raw what happened."

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While new satellite images show preparations for what is believed to be a coming long-range missile launch by North Korea, a second attempt in 2012 would be unprecedented, a top satellite image analyst said. There have been four launches of this scale since 1998, including a failed attempt in April of this year. A second launch in 2012 would be the first time North Korea has launched two systems of this class, their largest missile class, in less than three years.

"The fact that they are now apparently preparing for a second launch in 2012 indicated that the decision to do this was made at the highest level," said DigitalGlobe analyst Joe Bermudez. The North Koreans are looking for "maximum political impact" domestically, regionally and internationally with a test launch such as this, according to Bermudez, calling it a "very politically motivated event. “The timing of a launch at the end of this year would coincide with many consequential events, said Bermudez.

South Korea will be launching a rocket into space by the end of this week. North Korea and Japan will be holding another set of bilateral talks early in December and the South Korean presidential election will take place in less than a month. North Korea watchers say new leader Kim Jung Un may be responding to internal political pressure from hard-liners to send a message.

Details of a new satellite images released in the past few days, including one shot earlier this week, show increased activity at North Korea's Sohae Satellite Launch Station, suggesting a new launch could be possible in the next few weeks, according to DigitalGlobe. The United States has seen activity on the launch pad but does not believe a launch is imminent, U.S. military sources told CNN's Barbara Starr.

The newest image at North Korea's Sohae Satellite Launch Station was taken on November 26 and shows similar preparations as was witnessed ahead of the failed April 13th attempt to launch a satellite on top of a long-range missile, the DigitalGlobe analysis concludes.

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