Boxing Challenge: Catterall clashes with Eubank

      The boxing weekend was a tepid one, with two fights from Manchester, England as the main course.

Jack Catterall won a unanimous decision over Harlem Eubank when the fight was halted one second into the seventh round due to cuts to both fighters from a sixth-round head clash.

The cut suffered by Eubank was the one that officially ended the fight, but I thought Catterall's slice was the worst of the pair.

Catterall received the nod by scores of 69-65 twice and 69-66, which seemed about right.

Former IBF junior lightweight champion Joe Cordina returned for the first time since dropping his title to Anthony Cacace with a dominant unanimous decision win over tough but limited Jaret Gonzalez by scores of 100-90, 99-91, and 98-92.

Boxing Challenge: Opetaia outlasts Briedis, Cacace stuns Cordina

      The undercard for the Oleksandr Usyk-Tyson Fury main event was interesting with a world title back where it should have been all along, a surprising new world champion, a developing heavyweight contender, and what will hopefully be goodbye to a once-great fighter.

Jai Opietaia won back the IBF cruiserweight title that was stupidly stripped from him and repeated his 2022 win over Mairis Breidis by unanimous decision.

The fight wasn't quite as good as their first fight in action but it was similar with both fighters marking up the other, Opietaia building a large lead, and staving off the late rush by Briedis, who hurt Opietaia twice in the final few rounds.

Opietaia won the decision at 117-11 and two scores of 116-112, which was a little wider than my score of 115-113 for Opietaia.

In the upset of the day, underdog Anthony Carace stopped Joe Cordina in the eighth round to win the IBF junior lightweight title.

The win wasn't without controversy as in the third round, the referee yelled "break" and Cordina stopped fighting.

Carace didn't, cracking Cordina with a right hand and would send him to the canvas later in the round.

The fight was all Carace after that round as Cordia could not bounce back from the knockdown.

The punch did take a little of the shine of the surprising win for Carace.

Heavyweight Agit Kabayel continues to cement his reputation as a heavyweight contender as Kabayel dominated previously unbeaten Frank Sanchez and took him out in the seventh round with a body shot.

The normally smooth-boxing Sanchez clearly had knee issues from the start of the fight made him a sitting duck for Kabayel, who pressured Sanchez into submission.

Sergey Kovalev is at the end of his career as he lost almost every round to the unheralded Robin Safar and was knocked down in the final round in spectacular fashion.

Give Kovalev credit for getting up and avoiding the knockout but he's finished as a fighter, so continuing to box will only make things worse.

Boxing Challenge

Ramon Malpica: 75 Pts (4)

TRS: 63 Pts (3)

Vince Samano: 41 Pts ( 7)

Boxing Challenge: Cordina outlasts Rahkimov,

   The boxing weekend was more than only Gervonta Davis's win over Ryan Garcia as a world title changed hands in Cardiff, Wales and a minor beltholder staked a claim for a possible fall fight to determine yet again a true challenger for a unified champion's top contender position.

Matchroom/DAZN featured a fight that will be in consideration for fight of the year when that time arrives as Joe Cordina outlasted Shavkat Rahkimov via a split decision to regain the IBF junior lightweight title that he never lost in the ring.

The non-stop action swung back and forth between the two with the only major difference coming in the second round when Cordina knocked Rahkimov down briefly and after two, it appeared Cordina was on his way to a short evening with Rahkimov's knockdown and his right eye already showing the start of the damage that would see the eye almost closed by the fight's end.

Rahkimov began to close the gap over the middle rounds with a body attack that seemed to be slowing Cordina and the final two rounds would decide the fight on my scorecard which would appear to favor Rahkimov who has worn fighters down in the past for late round knockouts and his body attack.

Instead, it was Cordina that took control in those final two rounds by edging Rahkimov by being slightly busier and outworking him to win the fight on my card 114-113 and the second-round knockdown made the difference.

The knockdown made the difference on only one card, a 114-113 score for Cordina with the other two cards split at 115-112 for Cordina and a surprising 116-111 for Rahkimov.

Had Cordina not scored the knockdown, the fight would have finished in a draw with Rahkimov retaining the title.

Cordina won the title with a second-round KO of Kenichi Ogawa last June but was stripped last fall after a hand injury required surgery before a planned fight with Rahkimov with the IBF stripping him of the title.

The ruling was a bit harsh in my opinion as boxers take longer time than that in between fights anymore with no measures taken at all.

Rahkimov won the vacant title with a knockout over Zelfa Barrett with the provision that Cordina would receive a title shot immediately upon his return to the ring.

I certainly think a rematch would be acceptable and with the other champions in the division with other promoters (WBA champion Hector Luis Garcia and WBC champion O'Shaquie Foster are with PBC and WBO boss Emmanuel Navarette fights for Top Rank), a rematch with the action in this fight would seem to be an easy sell.

The top two undercard fights from the Davis-Garcia both were fought in the super middleweight division with a dominant first-round knockout from minor beltholder David Morrell taking center stage.

Morrell scored a standing eight count when he sent late replacement Yamaguchi Falcao against the ropes with only the ropes allowing Falcao to remain standing.

Morrell leaped on Falcao with another knockdown with the referee quickly waving the fight off.

Morrell may be pitted against David Benavidez in the fall in a fight that may decide just who the top contender to unified champion Canelo Alvarez truly is.

That was supposed to be decided by Benavidez's recent win over former IBF champion Caleb Plant but I think Morrell is more talented than Plant and while his opponents haven't been top-ten caliber, Morrell's talents and skills appear to be among the best in the division and Morrell could be an even larger threat to defeating Benavidez.

Hopefully, that fight can be signed (both fighters are promoted by PBC) if Alvarez doesn't fight Benavidez first as the winner would have a great claim for an inevitable fight with Alvarez.

Bektemir Melikuziev avenged his only defeat with a unanimous decision over shopworn veteran Gabriel Rosado via unanimous decision.

I haven't watched the fight yet but Melikuziev won with the scores reading 99-91 from all three judges.

Rosado announced his retirement after the fight.

Boxing Challenge

TRS: 68 Pts (3)

Ramon Malpica: 63 Pts (2)

Vince Samano: 55 Pts (5)

Boxing Challenge:Fulton Routs Roman, Cordina Crushes Ogawa

   Entering the PBC on Showtime card from Minneapolis on Saturday evening, two things seemed to be all but certain- Stephen Fulton's defense of his WBC and WBO junior featherweight titles against former WBA and IBF champion Danny Roman would be a close and exciting fight and David Morrell would look impressive in his super middleweight minor title defense against a seemingly overmatched Kalvin Henderson.

Morrell lived up to expectations but the Fulton-Roman pairing did not as Fulton outboxed and controlled Roman as no fighter had previously on his way to an easy unanimous decision to retain his two championships.

Fulton outboxed and outpunched Roman and never allowed the veteran to get into any type of rhythm by using a dominant jab and excellent counterpunches to smack Roman as he attempted fruitlessly to generate any offense with an inside attack.

Two judges saw a shutout for Fulton at 120-108 with the other arbiter giving Roman one round at 119-109.

I gave Roman two rounds for a 118-110 score for Fulton, who followed his majority decision win over Brandon Figueroa that many thought Figueroa won in a close fight with the best performance of his career against a former champion that only lost his titles by a borderline decision.

Fulton might begin to receive some consideration for entry in the pound for pound rankings after this impressive performance but Fulton is looking for bigger game- becoming an undisputed champion and called for WBA and IBF champion M.J Akhmadaliev, who defeated Roman to win those titles and has a scheduled defense in three weeks against mandatory challenger Ronny Rios.

That may be a difficult match to sign as Akhmadaliev is contracted to Matchroom and DAZN and Matchroom and PBC are seldom able to cross paths to make top fights but Eddie Hearn has been more willing to allow his fighters to fight elsewhere if the fight is important enough or could make the fighter more money, so there is a little hope.

A fight that would be easier to put together would be a rematch with Brandon Figueroa and most would love to see that considering the excellent action of the first fight, the closeness and that many gave Figueroa the edge.

If Fulton can't have Akhmadaliev, Figueroa would be an excellent consolation prize for boxing fans.

As for the co-feature, David Morrell bullied and bashed gritty but overmatched Kalvin Henderson on his way to a fourth-round knockout to retain his minor belt.

Morrell is now 7-0 with six knockouts but his competition hasn't been impressive although Morrell's performances certainly have been.

No knockdowns scored but Morrell trapped Henderson along the ropes and delivered punishment throughout with Henderson unable to do more than throw an occasional counter right to try to keep Morrell from swarming him.

Morrell certainly is talented and I'm very interested to see how he stacks up against better foes but fights against David Benavidez or against the winner of a rumored Caleb Plant-Anthony Dirrell fight would see the Cuban against a much-improved opponent and could prove to be more than he can handle unless he is a very special fighter.

One thing is certain though- Morrell is getting nothing but television exposure out of these glorified pummellings and if you are going to advertise your fighter as a 'champion', his "title defenses" can at least be against someone that can remotely give him a challenge.

Earlier in the day, a world title did change hands from Cardiff Wales as former Olympian Joe Cordina electrified his home crowd and Kenichi Ogawa with one overhand right that Ogawa never saw to take Ogawa's IBF junior lightweight championship via second-round knockout.

Ogawa hit the canvas very hard and was only able to move to all fours before the fight was rightfully concluded.

Cordina's victory may have been worth even more than winning the IBF title as he could parlay his win into a unification fight with WBC and WBO champion Shakur Stevenson, who has publically stated that he wishes to unify the division before an eventual move to 135 pounds.

Stevenson tweeted his congratulations and gave Cordina compliments from knowing him in the past with the interesting addendum that Stevenson would travel to Great Britain to face Cordina in a unification fight.

I believe Stevenson when he says this because he was willing to travel to the UK when he was at featherweight for a potential match with Josh Warrington which came very close to taking place, so I do believe Stevenson is serious about fighting on the road.

Joe Cordina may never have a better chance to become a star than in a unification fight with a star of Shakur Stevenson's status and to possibly have that fight in his home country, is almost too much to ask for and it all started with one overhand right.

Boxing Challenge

TRS: 98 Pts (3)

Ramon Malpica: 83 Pts (5)

Vince Samano: 81 Pts (3)