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Gatti-Robinson All But Forgotten As Gatti-Ward Legend Ascends
There are some names that are meant to be coupled forever: Sonny and Cher, Magic and Bird, Bonnie and Clyde, Romeo and Juliet, Tracy and Hepburn, DiMaggio and Williams, Borg and McEnroe.
And, of course, Ali and Frazier.
Arch-rivalries, and arch-alliances, stir the soul and fuel the imagination. That is as true in sports as it is entertainment, crime and literature, and there is no realm of athletic competition that lends itself to such mental associations as much as boxing, which pits one individual against another. When a clash of figurative titans is repeated often enough, it takes on the trappings of legend, more so than can ever be the case with single confrontations, or when teammates are involved. If Ali-Frazier is accepted as the gold standard, then the next level, just slightly down from the summit, consists of such revered series as Zale-Graziano, Pep-Saddler, Robinson-LaMotta, Holyfield-Bowe and maybe a few others.
Now ask yourself this: When anyone mentions the late action hero, Arturo Gatti, which opponent immediately comes to mind? The answer, in most cases, has become obvious.
âIrishâ Micky Ward.
But while the Gatti-Ward trilogy continues to ascend in the pantheon of boxingâs most acclaimed rivalries, with ample justification, the effect is the gradual diminishment of other bouts involving Gatti that also were so fiercely competitive they also deserve to be carefully stored away in fansâ memories as if they were family heirlooms. Gatti-Ward, Parts I, II and II, is terrific when considered as stand-alone segments or in its entirety, but not so much that the names of Wilson Rodriguez, Angel Manfredy and Rafael Ruelas deserve to be pushed off to the side, gathering dust.
But the principal victim of the continuing rise of Gatti-Ward is Ivan Robinson, who made the mistake â he didnât know it was a mistake at the time â of winning both of his immensely entertaining slugfests with Gatti in 1998, the first of which was voted Fight of the Year by both the Boxing Writers Association of America and The Ring magazine, although the rematch was a virtual carbon copy of the original.
If Robinson could have peered into the future, like some sort of pugilistic Nostradamus, he might have recognized that it would have served him better to have split those two fights with Gatti, creating a huge public demand for a rubber match. He would have recognized that he needed to take up golf and play a few well-publicized rounds with Gatti, and later on to agree to train the Italian-born, Montreal-reared, Jersey City-based fighter in the closing stages of his career. But it was Ward who did all that, and the back story of his friendship with Gatti took on a life of its own, each intersection of their lives embellishing what had taken place inside the ropes.
Dec. 12 marks the 16th anniversary of Robinsonâs second bout with Gatti in Atlantic City Boardwalk Hall, a fight so exhilarating that it left the combatants physically and mentally drained, but everyone else in attendance and those watching on HBO craving a third meeting that, alas, was not to be.
Lou DiBella, then the senior vice president of HBO Sports who later would form his promotional company and serve as an adviser to Ward, was almost hyperventilating after Robinsonâs razor-thin, unanimous 10-round decision, which would have ended in a majority draw had not referee Benji Esteves deducted a penalty point from Gatti in the eighth round for low blows. Gatti got the nod on the official cards by margins of 97-92 and 95-94 (twice).
âThis is unbelievable,â DiBella said after the last punch had been fired, and probably landed. âYou have to go back to Zale-Graziano, something like that, to even find something to compare to it. I mean, itâs ridiculous.
âIt doesnât get much better than that. Maybe these guys should just fight each other all the time.â
An interesting suggestion, but one in stark contrast to the scene in the ring after the final bell had sounded. After the traditional postfight hug of exhausted and respectful rivals, Robinsonâs manager, Eddie Woods, announced on-camera that his guy had forever concluded his business with Gatti.
âWe ainât fighting Gatti again,â Woods said with an air of finality.
Asked if he went along with what Woods had said, Robinson wearily agreed. âYou heard my manager. There wonât be a Robinson-Gatti III.â
Interestingly, after Robinson failed to take advantage of the opportunity that had been afforded him by his back-to-back conquests of Gatti â the Philadelphia lightweight lost a one-sided decision to Manfredy in his next bout four months later â two things became increasingly apparent. One, having twice gone to hell and back against Gatti while wearing a gasoline overcoat, Robinson was never the same as he had been on those two supercharged nights. And two, as his newfound star power began to ebb and Gatti remained a box-office draw and HBO staple, that third meeting he had said he would never consider became the object of a desperate quest that would not reach fruition.
âI know I can get another fight with Gatti,â Robinson said on Aug. 17, 2004, after he lost a desultory eight-round split decision to journeyman Reggie Nash at the Valley Forge (Pa.) Convention Center. âIf I can just put together a couple of good wins âŠâ
But it didnât happen for Robinson, whose fast-handed style at his peak was so likened to that of another Philly fighter, two-division world champion and 1984 Olympic gold medalist Meldrick Taylor, that some took to calling him âMeldrick Lite.â Robinson, whose preferred nickname is âMighty,â was 27-2 after his second points nod over Gatti, but just 5-10-2 following the second Gatti fight, finishing with a record of 32-12-2 with 12 victories inside the distance.
It was a good career, all things considered, good enough to earn Robinson enshrinement in both the Pennsylvania and New Jersey Boxing Halls of Fame. Still, the lingering impression is that Robinson too often was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Rated No. 1 by USA Boxing in the 132-pound weight class heading into the 1992 U.S. Olympic boxing trials, he lost a controversial decision to Julian Wheeler and then another in the box-offs, thus failing to gain inclusion on the American team that competed in Barcelona, Spain. He also likely made a likely misstep by declining, at Woodsâ urging, to accept a high-visibility bout with Oscar De La Hoya in Madison Square Garden because his manager believed he wasnât quite ready for a matchup with the âGolden Boy,â whom Robinson had faced several times in the amateurs. Jesse James Leija got the MSG gig with the emerging superstar instead, and Robinson never again got the chance to mix it up with De La Hoya.
In what would prove to be his only shot at a world championship, Robinson lost a unanimous decision to IBF lightweight titlist Philip Holiday of South Africa on Dec. 21, 1996, in Uncasville, Conn. He was released by his promotional company, Main Events, following his third-round stoppage by Israel Cardona on July 1, 1997, and he was viewed by as damaged goods, or at least in decline, when he was offered an HBO date against Gatti, who was coming off an eighth-round stoppage defeat, on cuts, in another slam-bam war against Manfredy on Jan. 17, 1998.
Hardly anyone expected what took place that night in Boardwalk Hall on Aug. 22, 1998. But Pat Lynch, Gattiâs longtime manager, had an uneasy feeling that Robinson might be something more than a mere bounce-back opponent for his man.
âEddie Woods will tell you I didnât want the (first) fight with Ivan,â Lynch recalled when interviewed for this story. âI thought he was a little too slick and too good a boxer for Arturo. I had watched a tape that Carl Moretti (then a Main Events executive) had given me of a fight Ivan had lost to some Spanish kid (Manuel De Leon), where Ivan didnât look that good. But even so, you could see flashes of that skill, that slickness. I thought to myself, `Maybe this is not a guy we want to fight right now.â
âSo, yeah, I always looked at Ivan as someone who would be a really difficult opponent for Arturo because of his style. I wasnât surprised that he was as tough as I thought heâd be. What did surprise me was the way he stood in there and traded with Arturo. He didnât run and make Arturo go after him. He was right there.â
Robinson, then 27, had decided beforehand that his best strategy was to meet Gatti head-on. If he lost, and was lackluster in doing so, his chance of regaining semi-elite status might be gone forever. And, besides, he knew that Gatti, as big a puncher and as much of a shock absorber as he was, was available to be hit. So why not just turn it loose?
Second seconds into the first round, Gattiâs left eye was discolored and puffy. That eye began to bleed in Round 3, but Gatti recovered enough to floor Robinson in the fourth and the action remained fast and furious to the final bell. When it was over, Robinson, a 5-1 underdog, had won by margins of 98-93 and 96-94 on the scorecards submitted by Melvin Lathan and Steve Weisfeld, respectively, with Ed Leahy going with Gatti by 96-93.
âExceptional. Exceptional,â said Lathan, who is now heads the New York State Athletic Commission. âI donât think I breathed the whole 10 rounds. Just wonderful.â
Said a tired but very happy Robinson: âThis was my best fight, even though it wasnât a championship fight. I thought I would get him out of there, but he always came back. Heâs like a stick of dynamite.â
There was an instant demand for a rematch, of course, and Robinson, who made $51,000 for the first fight, snagged a career-high $400,000 payday for the do-over, which he imagined would be fought more on his terms.
âI could have made the first fight a lot easier,â Robinson said as the days to the rematch counted down. â(Trainer) Butch (Cathay) was telling me that after every round. But in that fight, I had something to prove. Six months ago, nobody knew who Ivan Robinson was. Everybody had written me off.
âI know I have the best chin in the lightweight division. I wanted to prove â not to the fans, but to myself â that I could take Arturoâs best shot. Thatâs why, at times, I stood there with him and got hurt. And you kind of get lured into that because, well, Gatti is just so easy to hit. There wasnât a problem hitting Gatti then. There wonât be a problem hitting him now. Thereâs never been a problem hitting Gatti. The question I had in my mind was whether I could withstand his pressure. Iâve done that. For this second fight, I donât have anything to prove to anybody.â
But you know what they say about the best-laid plans. Gatti again turned the heat up on Robinson, and the same kind of war was fought at close distance. As was the case the first time, the Philadelphia in Robinson was brought out when he was challenged.
âI learned from being in the first fight that when you hurt Arturo, I guess that makes him mad,â Robinson said. âIt makes him go deeper into the gas tank.â
Itâs funny how things work out sometimes. Now saddled with a three-bout losing streak, it was thought that Gatti was the fighter that needed to be rebuilt; Robinson was seen as the hot property. But Robinson was easily outpointed his next time out by Manfredy while Gatti continued to be what DiBella called âThe Human Highlight Reel.â Their paths separated, Robinson drifting toward lesser revelance and Gatti moving on to megafights with De La Hoya and Floyd Mayweather Jr., the trilogy with Ward and eventual induction into the International Boxing Hall of Fame.
Asked for his memories of Robinson, DiBella said, âHe was a warrior, and a quality fighter. Those two fights with Gatti brought the very best out of him.
âBut Gatti was the draw. He was the HBO fighter. Even though Ivan won those fights, you didnât see him gain anything from that. It wasnât like he started getting all these big fights with big-name fighters. His career didnât take off all of a sudden because of him beating Gatti twice. Gatti was still that guy. He could lose a fight or even a couple of fights and still be someone everyone wanted to see more of.â
Lynch also thinks that maybe Gatti-Robinson has been somewhat shortchanged by history, at least in comparison to Gatti-Ward.
âI think maybe that has been the case,â Lynch said. âI think those two fights have been kind of lost. Arturoâs fights with Ivan were just incredible. They were very competitive, the crowd was on its feet pretty much from the beginning of each fight through the end. Itâs just that everybody was so sold on Arturoâs trilogy with ward, which deserves everything that it gets. But that doesnât change the fact that Arturoâs fights with Ivan were great, great fights.â
Prior to his Nov. 13, 2012, induction into the New Jersey Boxing Hall of Fame, Robinson said he didnât think Ward had bumped him all the way out of the spotlight as far as co-billing with Gatti is concerned.
âIâm pleased that so many people recognize what I did in my fights with Gatti,â he said. âI will always love Gatti. If it wasnât for him, I wouldnât be as known as I am today. And I donât (begrudge) Micky Ward for the acclaim he gets for his fights with Gatti. They were great fights and he deserves all the praise for what he did.
âMy only regret is that me and Micky Ward never fought. I wanted to fight him, he didnât want to fight me. I guess it was about money; it usually is when a fight doesnât get made. But donât get me wrong. I love Micky Ward, too. Iâm just glad to be in the mix of fighters who are always mentioned for being in great fights like the ones we had with Gatti.â
Now 43, Robinson is still in boxing as a trainer, working with young fighters at the Harrowgate Boxing Club in Philly. He said he is blessed to be in good health, and he is too busy with looking ahead to fret about what he might or might not have done in the past.
âI always felt that I was a great fighter,â he said. âI had some losses that I shouldnât have had before Gatti, and thatâs on me. But when I was able to get in that position again, I relished it. I thought I could beat Gatti, and I did. I did it twice. He was going to have to kill me to beat me. I think he did more in the first fight than he did in the second fight. After the fourth round of the second fight, I think he knew there was nothing he could do to beat me.
âI was a good fighter then, a smart fighter. I got what I could get and then I got out. Everything else is what it is. I got to be satisfied with that.â
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Boxing Odds and Ends: The Heavyweight Merry-Go-Round
Boxing Odds and Ends: The Heavyweight Merry-Go-Round
There were few surprises when co-promoters Eddie Hearn and Frank Warren and their benefactor HE Turki Alalshikh held a press conference in London this past Monday to unveil the undercard for the Beterbiev-Bivol show at Riyadh, Saudi Arabia on June 1. Most of the match-ups had already been leaked.
For die-hard boxing fans, Beterbiev-Bivol is such an enticing fight that it really doesnât need an attractive undercard. Two undefeated light heavyweights will meet with all four relevant belts on the line in a contest where the oddsmakers straddled the fence. Itâs a genuine âpick-âemâ fight based on the only barometer that matters, the prevailing odds.
But Beterbiev-Bivol has been noosed to a splendid undercard, a striking contrast to Saturdayâs Haney-Garcia $69.99 (U.S.) pay-per-view in Brooklyn, an event where the undercard, in the words of pseudonymous boxing writer Chris Williams, is an absolute dumpster fire.
The two heavyweight fights that will bleed into Beterbiev-Bivol, Hrgovic vs. Dubois and Wilder vs. Zhang, would have been stand-alone main events before the incursion of Saudi money.
Hrgovic-Dubois
Filip Hrgovic (17-0, 13 KOs) and Daniel Dubois (20-2, 19 KOs) fought on the same card in Riyadh this past December. Hrgovic, the Croatian, was fed a softie in the form of Australiaâs Mark De Mori who he dismissed in the opening round. Dubois, a Londoner, rebounded from his loss to Oleksandr Usyk with a 10th-round stoppage of corpulent Jarrell âBig Babyâ Miller.
Thereâs an outside chance that Hrgovic vs. Dubois may be sanctioned by the IBF for the world heavyweight title.
The May 18 showdown between Oleksandr Usyk and Tyson Fury has a rematch clause. The IBF is next in line in the rotation system for a unified heavyweight champion and the organization has made it plain that the winner of Usyk-Fury must fulfill his IBF mandatory before an intervening bout.
The best guess is that the Usyk-Fury winner will relinquish the IBF belt. If so, Hrgovic and Dubois may fight for the vacant title although a more likely scenario is that the organization will keep the title vacant so that the winner can fight Anthony Joshua.
Wilder-Zhang
The match between Deontay Wilder (43-3-1, 42 KOs) and Zhilei Zhang (26-2-1, 21 KOs) is a true crossroads fight as both Wilder, 38, and Zhang, who turns 41 in May, are nearing the end of the road and the loser (unless itâs a close and entertaining fight) will be relegated to the rank of a has-been. In fact, Wilder has hinted that this may be his final rodeo.
Both are coming off a loss to Joseph Parker.
Wilder last fought on the card that included Hrgovic and Dubois and was roundly out-pointed by a man he was expected to beat. Itâs a quick turnaround for Zhang who opposed Parker on March 8 and lost a majority decision.
Other Fights
Either of two other fights may steal the show on the June 1 event.
Raymond Ford (15-0-1, 8 KOs) meets Nick Ball (19-0-1, 11 KOs) in a 12-round featherweight contest. New Jerseyâs Ford will be defending the WBA world title he won with a come-from-behind, 12th-round stoppage of Otabek Kholmatov in an early contender for Fight of the Year. Liverpoolâs âWreckingâ Ball, a relentless five-foot-two sparkplug, had to settle for a draw in his title fight with Rey Vargas despite winning the late rounds and scoring two knockdowns.
Hamzah Sheeraz (19-0, 15 KOs) meets fellow unbeaten Austin âAmmoâ Williams (16-0, 11 KOs) in a 12-round middleweight match. East Londonâs Sheeraz, the son of a former professional cricket player, is unknown in the U.S. although he trained for his recent fights at the Ten Goose Boxing Gym in California. Riding a skein of 13 straight knockouts, he has a date with WBO title-holder Janibek Alimkhanuly if he can get over this hurdle.
The Forgotten Heavyweight
âUnbeaten for seven years, the man nobody wants to fight,â intoned ring announcer Michael Buffer by way of introduction. Buffer was referencing Michael Hunter who stood across the ring from his opponent Artem Suslenkov.
This scene played out this past Saturday in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. It was Hunterâs second fight in three weeks. On March 23, he scored a fifth-round stoppage of a 46-year-old meatball at a show in Zapopan, Mexico.
The second-generation âBounty Hunter,â whose only defeat prior to last weekend came in a 12-rounder with Oleksandr Usyk, has been spinning his wheels since TKOing the otherwise undefeated Martin Bakole on the road in London in 2018. Two fights against hapless opponents on low-budget cards in Mexico and a couple of one-round bouts for the Las Vegas Hustle, an entry in the fledgling and largely invisible Professional Combat League, are the sum total of his activity, aside from sparring, in the last two-and-a-half years.
Hunterâs chances of getting another big-money fight took a tumble in Tashkent where he lost a unanimous decision in a dull affair to the unexceptional Suslenkov who was appearing in his first 10-round fight. The scores of the judges were not announced.
You wonât find this fight listed on boxrec. As Jake Donovan notes, the popular website will not recognize a fight conducted under the auspices of a rogue commission. (Another fight you wonât find on boxrec for the same reason is Nico Ali Walshâs 6-round split decision over the 9-2-1 Frenchman, Noel Lafargue, in the African nation of Guinea on Dec. 16, 2023. You can find it on YouTube, but according to boxrec, boxingâs official record-keeper, it never happened.)
Anderson-Merhy Redux
The only thing missing from this past Saturdayâs match in Corpus Christi, Texas, between Jared Anderson and Ryad Merhy was the ghost of Robert Valsberg.
Valsberg, aka Roger Vaisburg, was the French referee who disqualified Ingemar Johansson for not trying in his match with LAâs Ed Sanders in the finals of the heavyweight competition at the 1952 Helsinki Olympics. Valsberg tossed Johansson out of the ring after two rounds and Johansson was denied the silver medal. The Swede redeemed himself after turning pro, needless to say, when he demolished Floyd Patterson in the first of their three meetings.
Merhy was credited with throwing only 144 punches, landing 34, over the course of the 10 rounds. Those dismal figures yet struck many onlookers as too high. (This reporter has always insisted that the widely-quoted CompuBox numbers should be considered approximations.)
Whatever the true number, it was a disgraceful performance by Merhy who actually showed himself to have very fast hands on the few occasions when he did throw a punch. With apologies to Delfine Persoon, a spunky lightweight, U.S. boxing promoters should think twice before inviting another Belgian boxer to our shores.
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Anderson Cruises by Vapid Merhy and Ajagba edges Vianello in Texas
Jared Anderson returned to the ring tonight on a Top Rank card in Corpus Christi, Texas. Touted as the next big thing in the heavyweight division, Anderson (17-0, 15 KOs) hardly broke a sweat while cruising past Ryad Merhy in a bout with very little action, much to the disgruntlement of the crowd which started booing as early as the second round. The fault was all Merhy as he was reluctant to let his hands go. Somehow, he won a round on the scorecard of judge David Sutherland who likely fell asleep for a round for which he could be forgiven.
Merhy, born in the Ivory Coast but a resident of Brussels, Belgium, was 32-2 (26 KOs) heading in after fighting most of his career as a cruiserweight. He gave up six inches in height to Anderson who was content to peck away when it became obvious to him that little would be coming back his way.
Anderson may face a more daunting adversary on Monday when he has a court date in Romulus, Michigan, to answer charges related to an incident in February where he drove his Dodge Challenger at a high rate speed, baiting the police into a merry chase. (Weirdly, Anderson entered the ring tonight wearing the sort of helmet that one associates with a race car driver.)
Co-Feature
In the co-feature, a battle between six-foot-six former Olympians, Italyâs Guido Vianello started and finished strong, but Efe Ajagba had the best of it in the middle rounds and prevailed on a split decision. Two of the judges favored Ajagba by 96-94 scores with the dissenter favoring the Italian from Rome by the same margin.
Vianello had the best round of the fight. He staggered Ajagba with a combination in round two. At the end of the round, a befuddled Ajagba returned to the wrong corner and it appeared that an upset was brewing. But the Nigerian, who trains in Las Vegas under Kay Koroma, got back into the fight with a more varied offensive attack and better head movement. In winning, he improved his ledger to 20-1 (14). Vianello, who sparred extensively with Daniel Dubois in London in preparation for this fight, declined to 12-2-1 in what was likely his final outing under the Top Rank banner.
Other Bouts of Note
In the opening bout on the main ESPN platform, 35-year-old super featherweight Robson Conceicao, a gold medalist for Brazil in the 2016 Rio Olympics, stepped down in class after fighting Emanuel Navarrete tooth-and-nail to a draw in his previous bout and scored a seventh-round stoppage of Jose Ivan Guardado who was a cooked goose after slumping to the canvas after taking a wicked shot to the liver. Guardado made it to his feet, but the end was imminent and the referee waived it off at the 2:27 mark.
Conceicao improved to 18-1 (9 KOs). It was the U.S. debut for Guardado (15-2-1), a boxer from Ensenada, Mexico who had done most of his fighting up the road in Tijuana.
Ruben Villa, the pride of Salinas, California, improved to 22-1 (7) and moved one step closer to a match with WBC featherweight champion Rey Vargas with a unanimous 10-round decision over Tijuanaâs Cristian Cruz (22-7-1). The judges had it 97-93 and 98-92 twice.
Cruz, the son of former IBF world featherweight title-holder Cristobal Cruz, was better than his record. He entered the bout on a 21-1-1 run after losing five of his first seven pro fights.
Cleveland southpaw Abdullah Mason, who turned 20 earlier this month, continued his fast ascent up the lightweight ladder with a fourth-round stoppage of Ronal Ron.
Mason (13-0, 11 KOs) put Ron on the canvas in the opening round with a short left hook. He scored a second knockdown with a shot to the liver. A flurry of punches, a diverse array, forced the stoppage at the 1:02 mark of round four. A 25-year-old SoCal-based Venezuelan, the spunky but out-gunned Ron declined to 14-6.
Charly Suarez, a 35-year-old former Olympian from the Philippines, ranked #5 at junior lightweight by the IBF, advanced to 17-0 (9) with a unanimous 8-round decision over SoCalâs Louie Coria (5-7).
This was a tactical fight. In the final round, Coria, subbing for 19-0 Henry Lebron, caught the Filipino off-balance and knocked him into the ropes which held him up. It was scored a knockdown, but came too little, too late for Coria who lost by scores of 76-75 and 77-74 twice.
Suarez, whose signature win was a 12th-round stoppage of the previously undefeated Aussie Paul Fleming in Sydney, may be headed to a rematch with Robson Conceicao. They fought as amateurs in 2016 in Kazakhstan and Suarez lost a narrow 6-round decision.
Photo credit: Mikey Willams / Top Rank via Getty Images
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Ellie Scotney and Rhiannon Dixon Win World Title Fights in Manchester
Englandâs Ellie Scotney started slowly against the long reach of Franceâs Segolene Lefebvre but used rough tactics and a full-steam ahead approach to unify the super bantamweight division by unanimous decision on Saturday.
âThereâs a lot more I didnât show,â said an excited Scotney (pictured on the left).
IBF titlist Scotney (9-0) added the WBO title by nullifying Lefebvreâs (18-1) reach and dominating the inside with a two-fisted attack in front of an excited crowd in Manchester, England.
For the first two rounds Lefebvre used her long reach and smooth fluid attack to keep Scotney at the end of her punches. Then the fight turned when the British fighter bulled her way inside with body shots and forced the French fighter into the ropes.
Aggressiveness by Scotney turned the fight in her favor. But Lefebvre remained active and countered with overhand rights throughout the match.
Body shots by Scotney continued to pummel the French championâs abdomen but she remained steadfast in her counter-attacks. Combinations landed for Lefebvre and a counter overhand right scored to keep her in the contest in the fifth round.
Scotney increased the intensity of her attack in the sixth and seventh rounds. In perhaps her best round Scotney was almost perfect in scoring while not getting hit with anything from the French fighter.
Maybe the success of the previous round caused Scotney to pause. It allowed Lefebvre to rally behind some solid shots in a slow round and gave the French fighter an opening. Maybe.
The British fighter opened up more savagely after taking two Lefevbre rights to open the ninth. Scotney attacked with bruising more emphatic blows despite getting hit. Though both fired blows Scotneyâs were more powerful.
Both champions opened-up the 10th and final round with punches flying. Once again Scotneyâs blows had more power behind them though the French fighter scored too, and though her face looked less bruised than Scotneyâs the pure force of Scotneyâs attacks was more impressive.
All three judges saw Scotney the winner 97-93, 96-94 and a ridiculous 99-91. The London-based fighter now has the IBF and WBO super bantamweight titles.
Promoter Eddie Hearn said a possible showdown with WBC titlist Erika Cruz looms large possibly in the summer.
âGreat performance. Great punch output,â said Hearn of Scotneyâs performance.
Dixon Wins WBO Title
British southpaw Rhiannon Dixon (10-0) out-fought Argentinaâs Karen Carabajal (22-2) over 10 rounds and won a very competitive unanimous decision to win the vacant WBO lightweight title. It was one of the titles vacated by Katie Taylor who is now the undisputed super lightweight world champion.
An aggressive Dixon dominated the first three rounds including a knockdown in the third round with a perfect left-hand counter that dropped Carabajal. The Argentine got up and rallied in the round.
Carabajal, whose only loss was against Katie Taylor, slowly began figuring out Dixonâs attacks and each round got more competitive. The Argentine fighter used counter rights to find a hole in Dixonâs defense to probably win the round in the sixth.
The final three rounds saw both fighters engage evenly with Carabajal scoring on counters and Dixon attacking the body successfully.
After 10 rounds all three judges saw it in Dixonâs favor 98-91, 97-92, 96-93 who now wields the WBO lightweight world title.
âItâs difficult to find words,â said Dixon after winning the title.
–Hometown Fighter Wins
Manchesterâs Zelfa Barrett (31-2, 17 KOs) battled back and forth with Jordan Gill (28-3-1, 9 KO-s) and finally ended the super featherweight fight with two knockdowns via lefts to the body in the 10th round of a scheduled 12-round match for a regional title.
The smooth moving Barrett found the busier Gill more complex than expected and for the first nine rounds was fighting a 50/50 fight against the fellow British fighter from the small town of Chatteris north of London.
In the 10th round after multiple shots on the body of Gill, a left hook to the ribs collapsed the Chatteris fighter to the floor. He willed himself up and soon after was floored again but this time by a left to the solar plexus. Again he continued but was belted around until the referee stopped the onslaught by Barrett at 2:44 of the 10th.
âA tough, tough fighter,â said Barrett about Gill. âI had to work hard.â
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