Last night I witnessed an atrocity in the ring. Andre Ward stepped into his rematch last night with Sergey Kovalev confident, and collected. With an onslaught of celebrities like Kevin Durant on site, this fight just felt big, and the energy was definitely focused on Ward.
The 'S.o.G' looked a bit hurried out the gate, it seemed like he wanted to fix the wrong of past fight errors, and in doing so he was able to stay in the fight more effectively and counter Kovalev well. It was a very close first 5 rounds in last night's main event. Kovalev retained center control of the ring but Andre was keeping rounds close, he would land a few counter blows to Kov's single, yet more powerful blows.
After nearly 8 completed rounds of battle, both men in the ring started tugging for the lead in points. Both fighters were worn and tired out, but Ward kept turning the fight into more of a wrestling match to wear out the long frame of his opponent. Ward has always been a cagey fighter, one who uses distance and clinching to achieve his goals of winning. Usually referees are smart to this type of behavior, but Tony Weeks (who usually acts as the seasoned ref he is) seemed to make a lot of blunders last night.
He excused many low blows from Ward last night, and in the 8th round Ward landed a flush combination of over three uppercuts to the cup section below Kovalev's belt line which actually ended the fight in favor of Ward (by technical knock out).
Last Night was a complete travesty, and it showed why opinions on modern day boxing are skewed...what are we to think whena man's knee hits the canvas for the first time in the fight and he is not given an 8 or 10 count to recover? This incident was after a first bout I saw clearly for Kovalev, so in essence this man was robbed twice, in front of the world!
People see what they want to see at the end of the day, but watch the fight for yourself if you feign any interest...last night took a little more life out of a sport I love.