Major props to Whyte & Chisora. Absolutely stole the show, in what was probably Fight of the Year. Personally I thought Chisora had done enough to edge a win. It's no secret Chisora has been on a downward spiral over the last few years, and his career is reaching the end, but last night he shook off those cobwebs & went to war. IMHO he wanted it more than Whyte, (as I mentioned the other day, I think that was due to Whyte riling him, to the point of unleashing the beast inside Del) I was amazed at how clean the fight was aswell. I was expecting a few more underhand tactics, but nothing. All-in-all, an Excellent fight.
Now, a not-so-excellent fight. We knew AJ -Molina would bomb, but it was worse than expected. Molina didn't even come to fight. It was on par with Audley's performance against Haye. And yet Sky all week have been saying how this is a potential banana skin test for AJ, how this guy could trouble AJ with his power. It's genuinely laughable, but incredibly insulting. That's why Hearn saved the Wembley announcement for last night, to soften the blow & distract fans away from that awful main event. And as for the Wembley showdown... Wow. Wlad not taking a tune-up is baffling me. He'll be 41, and coming off the back of a humiliating defeat, a year & a half ago. It's impossible to know what is left of him.
The rest of the card... Good performance from Yafai & great achievement to win the world title. Shame Conception had messed up on the weight, as it his performance didn't reflect hoe good he really is, but I take nothing away from Kal, who was excellent.
Katie Taylor. Nah sorry, not interested in women's boxing at all. No idea why her fight was so high up the card aswell. There's no way it should have been above a British Title Fight, nor a World Title Fight. I found that annoying TBH. And I'm not sure of Eddies angle with it. She'll never be a PPV draw, she won't add on lots of buys, and There's simply no depth in women's boxing, to warrant this kind of attention. Personally I thought it came across more of a circus act than a legitimate attempt at highlighting women's boxing.
Callum Smith - again made hard work of a relatively easy task. It's like he's not focused on the task in hand. And hopefully Blackledge is ok. He should have been pulled out of there much sooner. Ridiculous reffing/corner work there. Callum needs to up his game if he's gunna face the winner of Jack & DeGale.
I missed the Bug-Burton fight, but heard it was a real barnstormer. Need to watch it back.
Now I've woken up after my night shift and had to time to reflect here is my views:
Whyte vs Chisora is a contender for fight of the year it was the complete opposite of what I was expecting. They both put their all into it and like you said it appeared Chizzy wanted it more, whether that was down to Whyte underestimating him or just poor attitude I don't know. The fight was clean throughout which was really good to see and even Whyte showing some respect at the end. They both took some pretty heavy shots and they're both lucky that neither is a real heavy hitter otherwise there could've been a couple of knock downs. Chisora fought very intelligently by letting Whyte put his all in the first two minutes of the later rounds to gather his energy and then unleash a fury in the last minute. He looked at the best he can be this late in his career and I would love to see a rematch. As for the result when it was that close I had it Chisora winning by 1 round and thought it could be a draw. Whyte was never going to lose being the champion and a Matchroom fighter on a close decision like that. This fight needs to happen again because it was 12 rounds of pure entertainment.
Burton vs Buglioni was another great fight and it could've been something out of a Rocky film, all that was missing was Survivor - Eye of the Tiger being played. Burton looked sharp and in the early and middle rounds gave Buglioni a battering and judging by the state of his face I didn't think it was long before the towel was thrown or the ref stopped it. But out of nowhere Buglioni started to fight back and fight back well he had Burton on the back foot in the later rounds and gave him a battering. Burton looked like he had put all his efforts into the early to middle rounds and was starting to blow and this is where Buglioni pounced. His blow in the 12th was excellent and really saved the result because on the cards it would've been close but I could have only seen a Burton win. Buglioni fought with the heart of a lion and put in a hell of a performance that any boxer would be proud of. This and the Chisora fight stole the show.
Callum Smith is meant to be the best and most exciting of the Smith brothers. I'm not sure the right Smith was in the ring if this was the case. I don't know if it's clever tactics for the onlooking Jack and DeGale so they underestimate him. He seemed disinterested and looks way off world level. We shall see next year when he fights the winner of Jack vs DeGale. Agree totally that it should've been stopped early and I hope Blackledge is ok.
Yafai fight was another good fight, I didn't quite see the whole thing as I was messing about with the stream but it seemed like he had the upper hand throughout. Great to have another world champion on these shores.
Ortiz destroyed Allen a little later than GBJ expected but around where I thought he might. Allen took a punishing and didn't look like he had a chance at all. Ortiz will fight a couple of better fighters next and then I assume will be put up for a world title fight.
Quigg looked sharp and a nice little tune up fight for him.
Conor Benn fought the local taxi driver and knocked him out in 1 round. Not much else I can say about that. Need to give him some harder fights next year.
Katie Taylor what a load of crap, it was boring and a bit of an embarrassing fight and like you GBJ I'm confused as to why it was so high up the card. Like when's Conor Benn's debut was so high up the AJ vs Martin card it's all about trying to turn them into the next star. Well after that she doesn't look like the next star and as for women's boxing it still doesn't do anything for me. I can see why hearn is doing this because of the success of women's events in UFC he wants to get on that bandwagon but I'm afraid it's not going to happen anytime soon.
Now to the 'main event' a complete and absolute joke. It was like rewinding back to his early fights where they find a local bum in the streets and pay him £20 to take a bashing. Moline the guy who 'rocked' Wilder came out like a man scared (to which Carl Froch who I normally like as a pundit compared AJ to Mike Tyson in giving the same fear. Froch I like you but you cannot compare AJ to the greatest heavyweight of all time) and a man who was out for an easy payday. He was very defensive and looked like he may have been protecting an injury by the way he was holding his guard. It was an easy fight for AJ and an embarrassing one to call the main event on a PPV. Like GBJ said the announcement of the AJ vs Wlad fight was announced to take away the attention for a pathetic final bout.
Now onto AJ vs Wlad, great venue and will be a massive event for Matchroom. Carl Froch will be upset as he won't be the only person to sell out Wembley Stadium. Wlad is very brave taking this fight without a tune up. Does he think he can win? Probably with his experience but the guy is 41 years old and lost to Fury in his last fight. Is this just a last payday for him? Maybe, I think he thinks it's coming to an end if he wins then he can continue and get more paydays if he loses then he will have earnt a fortune on top of his riches from previous fights but can retire having fought the best throughout. It's nice to see AJ finally getting a test and I thought he would end up fighting Parker who won the WBO heavyweight title last night or Deontay Wilder but this is too much of a massive money spinner for Eddie Hearn to turn down.
And a final note here is a great tweet for the real champ himself, you have to admit he has a very valid point!