Terence "Bud" Crawford is the new undisputed world boxing champion in the super middleweight division. On Sunday evening, the 37-year-old American defeated and dethroned 35-year-old Mexican superstar Saul "Canelo" Alvarez in front of 65,000 spectators at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas, writes UNN with reference to Spiegel.
Details
After twelve rounds, judge Steve Weisfeld scored Crawford 116-112, while Tim Cheatham and Max DeLuca gave the American a 115-113 advantage.
This makes Crawford the first boxer to unify world titles in three different weight classes. He previously won the belts of all four major world federations (IBF, WBA, WBC, and WBO) in the super middleweight division in 2017. He also won all world titles in the welterweight division in 2023.
For Crawford, this was his 42nd victory in 42 professional fights.
His opponent, Alvarez, a world champion in four different weight classes and one of the best boxers in the world for ten years, suffered his third defeat in his 68th fight.
Alvarez previously lost to superstar Floyd Mayweather Jr. in 2013 and to the much larger and stronger light heavyweight champion Dmitry Bivol in 2022.
Crawford used his longer reach and excellent footwork to keep Alvarez at bay. The Mexican was unable to cut off his opponent, pin him against the ropes, and hit him with powerful hooks.
When Alvarez realized that his usual tactics were not working, he relied on single, particularly powerful punches to knock out the American. But Crawford skillfully dodged the attack and delivered several impressive combinations of his own.
In the ninth round, Alvarez rushed headfirst at his opponent and caused a cut near his eye with an unintentional headbutt, which did not cause much damage to Crawford.
As the fight neared its end, Alvarez took more risks. In the eleventh round, he briefly stunned Crawford, but in the final round, it was Crawford who landed the better punches again thanks to successful counterattacks.
The fight was organized by Turki Al-Sheikh, head of Saudi Arabia's General Entertainment Authority, in cooperation with UFC boss Dana White. It is expected to be one of the most-watched boxing matches in history. Netflix streamed the event as part of its standard subscription at no additional cost.
Until now, in professional boxing, especially in the US, it was common practice for major world championship fights to be broadcast as pay-per-view events, with television viewers having to pay to watch the broadcast.
The most successful pay-per-view fights reached about four million viewers in the US. Thanks to integration into Netflix's offerings, experts estimated that up to 100 million boxing fans in the United States alone could have seen Crawford's victory.
Addition
Serhiy Lapin, the director of the team of undisputed world heavyweight boxing champion Oleksandr Usyk, denied the accusations of the promoter of interim champion according to WBO Joseph Parker, David Higgins, regarding the "fake" injury of the Ukrainian boxer.
Promoters and the streaming service did a lot in advance to draw attention to the fight. Among other things, MrBeast, one of the world's biggest YouTube stars, was present at the event and, to promote it, allowed heavyweight legend Mike Tyson to punch him in the stomach.