the what fights did you watch today\scorecard thread.

Alexander Povetkin UD12 Ruslan Chagaev

Kind of a torch passing in that Chavaev was seen by many (including me) as the third best HW of the era just gone, and Povetkin was being seen, at that time, as being the new #3. I'm a huge Chagaev fan so I put off catching this fight around the time that it happened, but I needn't have worried. Povetkin doesn't really land anything serious all night, in fact it is Chagaev who wins his rounds more convincingly, Povetkin tends to win his by margins of three or four neat punches, and it really was fought in that kind of give-and-take am. style.

Both of them were pretty tired at the end, in spite of the reasonably pedestrian pace, Chagaev fading first but Povetkin more dramatically. Chageav wasn't totally empty, but a great deal of his sharpness had evaported, and most of the ability in his right hand seemingly with it. He still had a dangerous left but it was more clubbing and sweeping than the precision instrument it used to be.

Still, Chagaev's habit of finding the right plan seems still to be there, and after failing to gain any initiative with the same style he used against Wlad (waiting at a barely safe distance to step in and land) he swapped it out in the third for a creeping pressure which he used to edge Povetkin back. This bought him space and allowed him to bring that sweeping left into play.

Povetkin did okay, devoid of a left hook upstairs (maybe fair enough against a southpaw) he still made the left his major weapon throwing a nice sneak uppercut, left hand to the body with that paw. His jab was pretty sorry and the straight-right almost non-existent. It was an absorbing if not a great contest.

The silver lining, however, was mad Teddy. The relationship in the Povetkin corner is utterly bizarre, hampered as they are by their inability to use one another's language. So Teddy sounds off and a giant Soviet (Definitely Soviet...not Russian) translator murmurs into Povetkin's ear. What is incredible is that Atlas hasn't temptered his style at all, so after round 8 when it looked for a moment to be slipping away from Povetkin, he was greeted in the corner by a classic Atlas diatribe:

"DO YOU BELIEVE IN MAGIC?"

(looks at the translator who translates)

"TONIGHT...WE CAN BRING YOUR FATHER BACK TO LIFE."

In fairness, it may have worked, because the small spurt Povetkin managed at the beginning of round 9 seemed to take the last drop of wind out of Chagaev's sails.

CHAGAEV: 6,7,8,12
POVETKIN: 1,2,3,4,5,9,10,11

8-4 Povetkin.

 

WALTER MCGOWAN WPTS SALVATORE BURRUNI

McGowan looks pretty good here, tidy footwork that gets him out of range nicely whenever he meets Burruni headon and doesn't like it, remininds me of Ken Buchanan funnily enough but without the flash, it's generally just two steps and off, although he does do these alarming walks past that make him vulnerable to the right hand. His jab looks world class for the first two rounds as he double and even triples up on it, but he's forgotten this by the fourth whereupon it just becomes a pass for his right hand. Neglectful of his left hook although he has a decent sweeping one, and it's a left tht drops Burruni for a 2 count in the 8th. Nice uppercut to the body, too, although his body-punching is strictly as and when, his plan is based on a 1-2 from the outside. There's very little infighting here.

Burruni is probably passed prime at 33, but has about 90 fights worth of experience. He doesn't have much in the line of jabs, and tends to look a little crude next to the more elegant Hamilton man, but he shows decent body-punching and good pressure while his energy lasts.

By the end he's all used up though and a better puncher probably would have taken him out. When a badly cut McGowan decides to do nothing in the 15th, Burrini just allows it. Not a great fight, but a notable one for British boxing and a really classy boxing performance from McGowan.


MCGOWAN: 1,2,3,7,8,9,10,11,13,14
BURRUNI: 4,5,6,12
EVEN: 15

 

Chartchai Chionoi TKO7 Walter McGowan

Heartbreak for McGowan as (apparently for the second time) he is stopped on a cut whilst totally outboxing Chionoi, who lost every round I have on film (the fourth is missing). His jab is probably better than it was agaisnt Burruni and the right hand is just as good, as is the elusive footwork. He does get cilpped a couple of times though, and one of those punches opened a horrible, horrible cut above the left eye at the beginning of the fifth. Awful for McGowan, but it led to two really exciting rounds as the power-puff puncher tried to get his blows together for a stoppage win, he was swarming all over Chartchai who was all at see even versus the one-eyed McGowan. A flash in the sixth made it seem for a second to be possible and a follow up barrage incluing a flush right hand staggered the Thai for a moment, but just that. The first minute of the seventh was more even and maybe Walter knew the stoppage was inevitable at that point. Still a great shame though as McGowan was clearly the superior man.

 

Fred Apostoli W10 Paul Lewis

No scorecard,because it's only highlights but this fight delivers on its promise. A slow start is beggared as the two go to war for what appears to be the entire remainder of the fight with Apostoli generally dominating but Lewis hanging in there and very nearly putting the former champ on his ass in the ninth. The tenth belonged to Lewis as well until the final torrid exchanges when it looked like the KO might go the other way.

Apostoli is cagey in that he doesn't sell any punches, but Lewis just hags on in and when Apostoli starts to tire, he starts to throw more and more sold broadsides and Lewis starts to creep in with his own punishing punches. It must have been a real thrill to be ringside for this one, especially in the final five or so minutes when it looked really up in the air.

 

Vicente Saldivar W10 Ismael Laguna

I've only highlights of this too, and for a mixed barrell of bizarre reasons i've only ever seen it with no sound, so i'd often wandered if highlights had been parcelled to show the best of Saldivar, because this fight result is very controversial. However, having seen it just now, my copy isn't Mexican, it's Japaneese. That doesn't mean the highlights weren't biasedly packaged, but I do think it makes it more unlikely.

Saldivar does really well. The only rounds I have complete are 1 & 10, and Saldivar wins them both. He controlls distance well, staying just out of range of Laguna's excellent jab, then closing the distance suddenly, sometimes countering Laguna's jab with his own, sometimes swarming in with a fulller attack. It makes Laguna reluctant to punch I think, he's not so much risking being hit as risking losing that part of the round completely because Saldivar comes in and swarms on him for a few seconds with quite a lot of varied punches.

Laguna always looks a bit skittish. Although he always made a lot of moves, he had an overall sense of purpose if not top economy, he looked like he was making moves, feints, himself hard to hit, not so here. He looks a little frantic, a jack-in-the-box to Saldivar's Zen-master, face expressionless, motionless until it was time to move. Perhaps it was just the contrast.

UPI actually scored it for Saldivar but the LA Times named it "one of the great ring robberies." The Times reporter was sitting with Don Johnon's manager, it seems, and he might have got a little carried away, I don't know. I'd guess it was surely closer than these highlights make it look, whatever the particulars.

This is prime Laguna so it's a hell of a result if it's fairish. Of course Saldivar would go on to beat names that would make the result seem credible, but at this time, he was on the green side (though Mexian champion).


Anyone seen the whole thing? I bet RB or SS have, anyone at all?