Boxing

Hopefully Khan will retire now. Can't fight anymore

Always liked Josh Taylor, but last night Jack Catterall was robbed of the world title after putting on a technical masterclass. Split decision in which one judge gave it to Taylor by three rounds - not sure what fight he was watching....Catterall's accuracy was outstanding all night and he got a knockdown.
Dodgy decisions like this don't do boxing any favours.



Just seen Carl Frampton's undiluted assessment of the decision..

I followed it live.

Think this about sums it up -

Posted at 23:20 26 Feb
'I'm embarrassed' - Shalom
Taylor beats Catterall by split decision

Ben Shalom, founder and CEO of Boxxer, says on Sky Sports: “I’m embarrassed tonight, I’m promoting this event.

"I love this sport and we try to keep our integrity, but tonight is really difficult. That’s heart-breaking for Jack.”


Posted at 23:20 26 Feb23:20
Post update
When the promoter of the event is saying that, it probably tells you everything...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/live/boxing/60482453

I watched this and it was a scandalous decision! How one judge scored it 114-111 to Taylor is beyond me and all the boxing experts at ringside and beyond.

Catterall was robbed and may not get the chance of a rematch as Taylor want to move up in weight.

Thing is that Catterall has waited for years to get a title shot and to have that - and the life-changing money he would have earned defending the title taken away like that is scandalous.

wanderlust wrote:Thing is that Catterall has waited for years to get a title shot and to have that - and the life-changing money he would have earned defending the title taken away like that is scandalous.

I was disgusted. Why would anyone want to get involved in a sport with this level of incompetence at the top?

If it's an issue of integrity, then why can't the boxing authorities review the extensive film of the fight and put the judges under scrutiny in the same way that the football panel reviews red cards/dubious goals etc?
Do they not have the power to overturn bad decisions?

wanderlust wrote:If it's an issue of integrity, then why can't the boxing authorities review the extensive film of the fight and put the judges under scrutiny in the same way that the football panel reviews red cards/dubious goals etc?
Do they not have the power to overturn bad decisions?

The thing is though those judges who scored this for Taylor and against ARE highly rated and deemed to have integrity from many years of judging bouts -

...two of the three judges gave it to him. Victor Loughlin, of Scotland, scored it 113-112. Ian John-Lewis, of England, scored it 114-111 to Taylor, a three-round victory that stunned all those experts who watched the same fight and yet came up a vastly different outcome.

It's not like Loughlin and John-Lewis are day trippers to the profession. Loughlin refereed his first fight in 1996 and became a judge in 2002. John-Lewis started his refereeing life in 1992 and sat as judge for the first time in 1998.

Between them they have refereed or judged more than 2,500 fights going back 30 years. You could scarcely get more experienced operators...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/boxing/60546388

And fwiw not everybody marked the bout as a win for Catterall...

Andre Ward, the American former two-weight world champion, gave it to Taylor.

(Although he was probably the only one who did!)


It seems highly unlikely that the judges were nobbled - remember the third judge only gave it to Catterall by one point - so maybe it really was far more closer than all of us thought it was (me included)?

I get that, but the question for me is what did Taylor do to win it? Nothing according to the official punch count:

Taylor landed 73 body punches to Catterall's 120, 16 jabs to Catterall's 39 and 57 power punches to Catterall's 81

So on what basis did they give it Taylor?

There are too many of these decisions going the wrong way these days, people already have lost confidence in boxing because of it and the casual fan will just stop bothering with the sport altogether if this continues.

Is it a mixture of a home crowd influencing judges or just plain old incompetence or worse corruption?

If Taylor moves up then Catterall should be first in line to fight for at least one of the belts if not all of them.

wanderlust wrote:I get that, but the question for me is what did Taylor do to win it? Nothing according to the official punch count:

Taylor landed 73 body punches to Catterall's 120, 16 jabs to Catterall's 39 and 57 power punches to Catterall's 81

So on what basis did they give it Taylor?

I don't know as I'm not a trained judge.

Punch counts mean nothing in themselves, what I mean by that is they only matter in the round they were thrown - and each round is marked individually out of 10.

So it could be that one boxer throws the majority of all his punches in say five rounds, very few in any of the others, ends up with more punches thrown and more power punches but still loses the contest with 5 rounds won to seven rounds lost.

I can only assume there is also some form of weighting towards what sort of punches are landed maybe a body punch thrown from distance doesn't carry the same importance to the judge as one thrown from close in.  Maybe a 'flicked out' jab on the retreat isn't deemed to sway the judging as a ramrod one thrown as the opponent walks on to it.

Whatever way they mark it TWO of the three judges marked it very close - one giving it to Taylor by 1 point, the other to Catterall by 1 point - my point here being that punch count alone clearly doesn't necessarily determine the result.

I guess you really need to see the punch breakdown by rounds and compare them to how the judges marked their scores for those rounds to get some idea as to how the judges were viewing the contest and thus their eventual verdicts.

Josh Taylor-Jack Catterall: British Boxing Board of Control investigates scoring after split decision

The British Boxing Board of Control will investigate the scoring in Josh Taylor's split decision win over Jack Catterall on Saturday.
The BBBoC said it "will be investigating the scoring of this contest and will advise accordingly".
The board does not have the power to overturn the result.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/boxing/60559433

Sluffy wrote:


Whatever way they mark it TWO of the three judges marked it very close - one giving it to Taylor by 1 point, the other to Catterall by 1 point - my point here being that punch count alone clearly doesn't necessarily determine the result.

I guess you really need to see the punch breakdown by rounds and compare them to how the judges marked their scores for those rounds to get some idea as to how the judges were viewing the contest and thus their eventual verdicts.

The result is decided by the judges and that's the problem.

As for round by round punch count it went:

Punches landed Catterall landed more in 11 out of 12 rounds
Jabs landed Catterall landed more in 10 rounds, the other 2 being equal
Power punches landed Catterall landed more in 9 out of 12 rounds

Fact is this is boxing and Catterall hit Taylor a lot more than the other way round AND knocked him to the canvas.

Scandalous that it can't be overturned.

wanderlust wrote:

Sluffy wrote:


Whatever way they mark it TWO of the three judges marked it very close - one giving it to Taylor by 1 point, the other to Catterall by 1 point - my point here being that punch count alone clearly doesn't necessarily determine the result.

I guess you really need to see the punch breakdown by rounds and compare them to how the judges marked their scores for those rounds to get some idea as to how the judges were viewing the contest and thus their eventual verdicts.

The result is decided by the judges and that's the problem.

As for round by round punch count it went:

Punches landed Catterall landed more in 11 out of 12 rounds
Jabs landed Catterall landed more in 10 rounds, the other 2 being equal
Power punches landed Catterall landed more in 9 out of 12 rounds

Fact is this is boxing and Catterall hit Taylor a lot more than the other way round AND knocked him to the canvas.

Scandalous that it can't be overturned.

Hardly knocked him to the canvass, he only went down on one knee - and being knocked down doesn't win you the fight - look at Tyson Fury getting up to beat Wilder for instance.

As I said above, maybe the the quality of punches are more important than the number thrown?

As for scandalous, I can't think of many (any?) sporting bodies that overturn results - how many times have we seen footy referees made the wrong decision and it cost some team the game - West Ham fielded illegal players and caused Sheffield United to get relegated from the PL instead of them - but the results were never changed.

Maybe the inquiry will justify the judges verdict - as I keep saying it clearly wasn't that one sided or the judge who scored it in favour of Catterall would have given him it by 9 rounds to 3 (on power punches), 10 rounds to 2 (on jabs landed) or 11 rounds to 1 (on punches landed).

He scored it to Catterall by 1 point (which usually means by 2 rounds) so he saw it as 7 rounds to 5 for Catterall.

It does make you wonder though how one judge gave it by 3 points or 9 rounds to 3 for Taylor???

I've not been too impressed with Lindsay Hoyle recently - even less so today!!!

Josh Taylor vs Jack Catterall scoring referred to police by the Speaker of the House of Commons

"I have to question why the judges got it so wrong? I have already sent a letter to the police," Sir Lindsay Hoyle, Jack Catterall's MP in Chorley, told Sportsmail

https://www.skysports.com/boxing/news/20876/12560618/josh-taylor-vs-jack-catterall-scoring-referred-to-police-by-the-speaker-of-the-house-of-commons

I AM IN TEARS WHAT ON EARTH
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Fight of the year already?

I had DAZN for a few months and watched it once so got rid of it but there does look to be some good fights coming up on there now. Read about this fight but not watched the highlights yet, Carl Frampton said it's the best fight he's ever seen!

Blimey.