Dmitry Bivol’s promoter, Eddie Hearn, is adamant that he won last Saturday’s fight against Artur Beterbiev and that he should be the undefeated light heavyweight champion today.
If Hearn gets his way, Bivol will get another chance to fight unified champion Beterbiev for his titles. We don’t want Bivol to fail to engage like he did last time, lose, and then Hearn cry that he won and make a fuss about wanting another rematch. Fans don’t want to see endless reruns.
Hearn is looking for a rematch with his loser, Bivol (23-1, 12 KOs), but that is out of his hands.
Honorable Turki Alalshikh will have to decide if he wants Bivol to challenge undisputed champion Beterbiev (21-0, 20 KOs) next or put him in line for a shot at beating one of David Benavidez’s David Morrell fighters. or Joshua Buatsi.
Bivol fought well in the first four rounds but did nothing in the last eight rounds. There were very few punches landed by either team between the first and fourth rounds. Hearn says he’s had Bivol win four of the first five or all of the rounds.
That would not happen because there was not enough offense for Bivol to win more than two. The punch counts were very close, but Beterbievs shots were much harder.
“I will not go back to my shell. ‘I get a little clingy about my feelings in the war.’ I went down twice. We won the fight, and we want a rematch,” said Eddie Hearn speaking to Matchroom Boxing, stressing that his boxer Dmitry Bivol deserved to win against Artur Beterbiev, and now he wants a rematch.
“The 116-112 card upset me, and I thought it was unacceptable. I was surprised that the three judges, none of them gave Dmitry Bivol that fight if you look at the general reaction. I truly believe that Dmitry Bivol deserves to be the undisputed champion.”
Hearn shouldn’t have been fazed by the 116-112 result because it was clear that Beterbiev was the one holding the fight in the last six rounds. Bivol was doing nothing but using his Sugar Ray Leonard style, which he copied from Ray’s fight with Marvin Hagler. That fight was considered controversial by many fans who have seen it over the years.
“I thought Bivol punched well. He actually gave it some rounds after the war. He had to work harder in those rounds. For me, Dmitry Bivol is the winner. If you really know your boxing, you know what Dmitry Bivol was doing in that fight.
“If you look at most of that fight, he was brilliant. Artur fired several shots, but how many did he get? Where I was sitting three rows back, they all gave it to Dmitry Bivol.
“Beterbiev threw a lot of punches later in the fight. He got nothing at the beginning of the war. “I felt after four or five rounds, it was either a sweep or I gave Beterbiev one round,” said Hearn.
Again, neither fighter landed more punches in the first half of the fight, but Beterbiev landed the hardest punches. Beterbiev’s shot was heard when they sat down, and they made a great noise.
“That judge didn’t treat you well,” Hearn said of the judge who scored Beterbiev 116-112. “I was 8-4 [for Bivol]. 7-5 with no real bias. “Where I was sitting, six meters from the ring, I felt that Dmitry Bivol was in charge of the fight of the people,” said Hearn.
The judge’s 116-112 score apparently saw Beterbiev dominating the second half, as did many, and he won at least two of the first six rounds. It’s easy to come to that same point because Bivol did nothing in the second half of the fight. He did not win the first six rounds. Best of all, Bivol won three of the first six and entered the last six.
Source link
