Date: Saturday, April 8, 2017
WBO Lightweight Championship
Location: Manchester Arena, England
Promoter: Frank Warren
Supervisor: John Handelaar
Referee: Marcus McDonnell
Judges: Terry O’Connor (116-112), Mikael Hook (120-108), Zoltan Enyedi (118-110)
Results: The WBO Lightweight Championship was retained by the champion Terry Flanagan by Unanimous Decision over Peter Petrov.
TV: Box Nation
Credit: Photo by Dave Thompson/Getty Images / Liam Smith made a successful defense of his WBO title today in Manchester.
Liam Smith made a successful first defense of his WBO junior middleweight title today in Manchester, stopping Jimmy Kelly in the seventh round when Kelly’s corner threw in the towel.
Smith (22-0-1, 12 KO) did the job in front of him, and while the fight was rightly criticized coming in due to Kelly (16-1, 7 KO) being a totally unproven fighter with a paper ranking from the WBO allowing the fight to happen at all, the fight itself was an enjoyable watch, with both guys working hard and throwing punches. Kelly, 23, had never even fought at the higher levels domestically before this fight, but he showed up and looked pretty solid at moments, before he was eventually overwhelmed by the pressure and power of the 27-year-old titleholder.
While BoxNation’s TV scoring had this a shutout at the time of the stoppage, BLH actually gave Kelly two of the first three rounds, and he had plenty of success in a couple of others, too, before he started to look a bit worse for wear in round six. That round, perhaps frustrated by the way things were going, Kelly threw a pretty blatant headbutt into the mix, costing him two points on the cards. BLH had it 58-54 for Smith at the time of stoppage.
The stoppage came in a bit of an unusual manner, as Kelly was being battered against the ropes, just worn out by the pressure from Smith, when he basically collapsed without being hit again. Referee Marcus McDonnell oddly ruled this to not be a knockdown — it was, and should have been called as one — but it didn’t matter. Kelly’s corner knew the score, and they waved it off with the white towel moments later, saving their fighter.
Smith won the title in October, so made a quick turnaround for his first defense, saying that he didn’t even have time to celebrate winning before he had to get ready for the next fight. He recently negotiated for a fight with Shane Mosley (to whatever degree the negotiations were serious), and we’ll have to see what he does next. He’s got the belt, but he’s also known only in the UK.
Promoter Frank Warren floated the name of Miguel Cotto after the bout in the post-fight interviews.
“In an ideal world, I’d like to get him out again in February on the Liverpool show. If he wants to do that, it’s not a problem. If not, we’ll sit down with his management and work out an opponent,” Warren said. “The Cotto fight, if we could make that, I think we’d all be happy. But it’s about (Liam Smith). He’s still got a long way to go. I think he’s only going to get better and better.”
“I’d love to (fight in February),” Smith said. “I’m going to make a decision in the next couple of days. But I don’t want to come flat and let all the hard work go. But I would love to do that fight in Liverpool.”
Date: Saturday, December 19, 2015
WBO JR. MIDDLEWEIGHT CHAMPIONSHIP TITLE BOUT
Location: Manchester Arena (formerly M.E.N. Arena), Machester, Lancashire, United Kingdom
Promoter: Queensberry Promotions / Frank Warren
Supervisor: Luis Perez
Referee: Marcus McDonnell
Judges: Phil Edwards (60-52); Terry O’Connor (60-52); Dave Parris (60-52)
Results: Liam Smith made a successful first defense of his WBO junior middleweight title stopping Jimmy Kelly in the seventh round when Kelly’s corner threw in the towel.
TV:
Date: Saturday, December 19, 2015
WBO MIDDLEWEIGHT CHAMPIONSHIP TITLE BOUT
Location: Manchester Arena (formerly M.E.N. Arena), Machester, Lancashire, United Kingdom
Promoter: Queensberry Promotions / Frank Warren
Supervisor: Francisco Valcarcel, Esq.
Referee: Steve Gray
Judges: Phil Edwards (112-114); Dave Parris (111-115); Marcus McDonnell (113-113)
Results: Billy Joe Saunders is the new WBO middleweight champion by a 12 round majority decision over Andy Lee.
TV:
Date: Saturday – October 10, 2015
VACANT WBO JR. MIDDLEWEIGHT CHAMPIONSHIP TITLE BOUT
Location: Manchester Arena (formerly M.E.N. Arena), Manchester, Lancashire, United Kingdom
Promoter: Queensberry Promotions / Frank Warren
Supervisor: Istvan Kovacs
Referee: Marcus McDonnell
Judges: Steve Gray (56-58); Mark Nelson (57-57); Andre Van Grootenbruel (57-57)
Results: Liam Smith has become the new WBO Jr. Middleweight champion after seeing off John Thompson with a seventh-round knockout.
TV:
Date: July 11, 2015
Title: Vacant WBO Lightweight Championship title Bout
Location: Velodrome, Manchester, Lancashire, United Kingdom
Promoter: Queensberry Promotions/Frank Warren
Supervisor: Istvan Kovacs
Referee: Marcus McDonnell
Judges: Ramon Cerdan, Zoltan Enyedi, Carlos Ortiz Nieves
Result: Terry Flanagan won the WBO Lightweight Championship Title by TKO in the second round. Zepeda suffered a dislocated right shoulder and remained on his stool at the end of the 2nd round, referee McDonnell waved the bout off after speaking with Zepeda’s corner team.