There are never a couple of 10-10 rounds. Theres rarely one nevermind a couple in the same fight. Bottom line is the main scoring criteria for boxing - clean effective punching, effective aggression, defence, ring generalship. Dirrell landed the only decent punches, showed better defence, showed the only effective aggression in the fight.
Normally I would say 7 rounds, I said 6 because of the point taken off. Personally, I don't score rounds even. Could argue Froch should have had a point taken too.
You mean I look to the criteria for scoring boxing matches and you don't? Froch didn't land a meaningful punch all night, period.
Froch-Dirrell is one of those fights that set people off in strange directions. I felt Dirrell had it by one round after the point deduction (so two rounds) at the time, but then my old friend Graham Houston made an excellent point (shame the site got updated and the archive disappeared): That was the problem, really - Dirrell gave the impression he didn't want to fight and was running away from Froch. Yes, we can all sit there with a video and say "Dirrell outlanded Froch!" but when you're watching the fight, body language counts for a lot. The constant holding, mauling and outright sprinting gave the judges a negative view of him, because he was fighting negatively. That was a stupid tactic considering, when he chose to open up, he beat Froch to the punch and wobbled him a couple of times. So let's stop calling it a robbery - Dirrell opened the door to the result. But where the **** is all this "Ward is UNBEATABLE" stuff coming from? He's a good fighter with an enviable skill set (and I do think he'll beat Froch) but he can be caught. He's open to uppercuts, he's got a tendency to maul on the inside, and he sometimes likes to coast instead of taking the initiative. I wouldn't be surprised if a good mover like Bute took him out when he leads with the head. I like Ward actually, just wish he'd shut the **** up when he tries the Hopkins mental domination tactics.
He already moaned about that on his website. Haven't read it yet though. I do think, in general, he's a fair judge so I can forgive those times we disagree.
I don't see anything I said that was so controversial. Froch has benefitted from fighting at home to a greater extent than Ward, I don't see what the problem with that is. I, and not many people, can see how Froch beat Dirrell(body language is not a scoring criteria, and if someone is influenced by it then I'm sorry, but that's called poor judging, and it's not an excuse. Dirrell did what you need to do in order to score points, and Froch didn't, I can't understand how being extraordinarily negative while doing so should detract from that:conf), even if you think he won in a razor-thin fight that's still proving my point, as Ward hasn't even been involved in a fight that could be considered close. There are people that have flat out said that they are biased towards Froch, again, not controversial from me. In fact, a thread was made today where a guy said that, downplayed Bute's win over Johnson to a ridiculous extent before he added that he was a Froch supporter and very biased, and it was probably the main component of why he made the thread in the first place. More posters than him have said things along these lines, what's wrong with saying there's plenty of people here who have been biased towards him? They've admitted it themselves ffs. As I said earlier I was trying to get a rise out of Will earlier, no hard feelings like, it was mostly because he kept up the tedious ''intelligence'' shite, but my point still stands(and it's a relevant point,whether or not certain people can't comprehend that it is), Ward comes under a lot of unjustified scrutiny here, and it does **** me off to an extent which is why I tend to go off on one at times. I won't apologise for it either, some of it is ridiculous. I said it in Rob's build up thread, he gets chastised for things others get labelled as ''smart'' fighters for, it's double standards, and it's blatant at that.
Hows it arrogant mate? Those are the criteria for scoring boxing matches. Anything else - i.e. going along the lines dftaylor did about how Dirrell took a negative appearance and you 'can't win titles like that' simply aren't correct. Thats not my opinion, thats what the rules for scoring boxing matches say. Or don't say.
And BTW, I'm by no means a fan of Dirrell or his fighting style. I absolutely hated his tactics. I hated George Groves 'performance' against DeGale too to a lesser extent also. It's not my cup of tea for sure. But at the end of the day Froch was completely ineffective, and Dirrell was somewhat effective. Dirrell could and should have made it clear though, his mental fragility cost him dearly.