British Scene Weekend Recap: Burns Battles His Way To Glory, Smith Edges Simpson

Dave Oakes recaps this past weekend's British boxing action.

Ricky Burns produced a superb performance on Saturday night to become the WBO super-featherweight champion. Hardly anyone was picking the hometown hero before the fight but he survived an early knockdown, gritted his teeth and came back to rip the title away from Roman Martinez on points.

A confident looking Burns made a bright start to the fight, picking off Martinez and landing a solid right hook that stopped Martinez in his tracks. However, if Burns wanted a warning about Martinez’s much touted power he got one. The round was coming towards an end when Martinez unleashed an overhand right than sent Burns crashing backwards onto the seat of his pants. Burns wasn’t badly hurt, and was back on his feet quickly, but most people viewed it as an ominous sign of what they believed was coming.

If Martinez thought he was going to build on the knockdown and bulldoze Burns in the following round he was much mistaken. Burns controlled the round throughout, catching a wide-open Martinez at will.

The third was another round that went in Burns’ favour, he was outboxing Martinez surprisingly easily and landed several head rattling uppercuts that seemed to have an effect on the Puerto Rican’s legs. Yet again Martinez landed a hard right just before the bell, but unlike the first round, Burns stayed on his feet and saw out the remaining few seconds of the round.

Despite the early knockdown in his favour, Martinez had made a massively disappointing start to the fight, he looked slow, lacking in basic skills, had an appalling defence and looked completely bereft of ideas. The only thing he had that looked as though it could win the fight for him was his punch power, although he was missing with far more punches than he was landing with and was becoming very predictable.

The fourth and fifth were big rounds for Burns; he couldn’t miss Martinez and looked as though he may stop the champion towards the end of a one-sided fifth. Burns landed a straight right - left hook combination that hurt Martinez a minute into the round, the Scot followed up with a barrage of shots but Martinez weathered the storm. Burns continued to dominate the round and very nearly dropped Martinez with a clubbing right that had the champion’s knees buckling as the round came to an end.

Martinez tried to drag himself back into the fight in the sixth, he upped the pace of his work and went to the body for the first time in the fight, of which one punch was well low but went unnoticed by the referee.

Round seven proved to be Martinez’s best of the fight. Burns began the round well enough, landing another solid uppercut and a right hook shortly afterwards, but Martinez responded with an accurate left hook that wobbled Burns. Martinez jumped on a visibly shaky Burns, swarming all over him and landing several heavy blows.

Somehow Burns made it through a torrid round. Martinez, whilst being wild and awfully easy to hit, proved that he was still going to be dangerous in the later rounds. Burns regained control in the eighth, though, and dominated the ninth, apart from another scare late in the round when a Martinez left hook had him in trouble again. Burns had been dominant apart from the odd time he got caught with a Martinez bomb and went into the final three rounds with a healthy lead on my card.

Martinez had looked to be tiring in the previous two rounds but dragged himself through the final three rounds, even producing a sterling effort in the last round, although it was to no avail. Burns won all three rounds on my card, even though he was on the receiving end of another monstrous left hook at the end of the eleventh that had him shaken again.

I had Burns a comfortable winner by a six point margin; the judges had it slightly closer than that, two scoring the bout 115-112 and the third scoring it 115-113.

It was a very entertaining fight throughout and a fantastic way to start the new boxing season. Burns was exceptional, he performed to a standard greater than anything he’d produced before and showed tremendous heart every time he was hurt by one of Martinez’s bombs.

Burns’s trainer, Billy Nelson, also deserves praise for the game plan he devised – it worked an absolute treat. Martinez was very disappointing; he was one-dimensional, flat-footed and struggled to work out Burns’ style. Burns deserves to receive the plaudits though, he accomplished something that most boxers could only ever dream of and earned it through hard work and dedication.

The most anticipated fight of the night was John Simpson’s Commonwealth title defence against Stephen Smith. Unfortunately the fight wasn’t the barnstormer most were expecting, although it still had the crowd engrossed throughout.

Smith made the better start, his speed causing Simpson some problems in the first two rounds. He also took the third on my card; although he picked up a cut by his right eye in the round which seemed to throw him out of his rhythm for the next few rounds.

Simpson began to find his feet from the fourth round onwards, dragging the inexperienced Smith into a toe-to-toe battle. I had Simpson winning rounds four to six through his aggression and work-rate.

The final six rounds were give and take, neither boxer being able to establish any sort of control over the other. At times the action was a touch untidy, with both fighters guilty of holding on the inside.

Both Smith and Simpson raised their hands at the final bell, both believing they’d done enough to take the decision. I couldn’t split them (115-115) and wasn’t surprised when a split decision was announced.

Two of the judges had it 116-114, one in favour of Smith, the other for Simpson, the third and decisive score was announced as 116-112, everyone held their breath before the MC announced it was in favour of the new champion.

Simpson can count himself slightly unlucky to lose such a close fight in front of his hometown fans. Smith battled well and did the championship distance easily, which should be a major plus for him as he moves forward. He did look ragged on the inside at times and has plenty of things to work on, but he should be pleased that he’s become a Commonwealth champion in just eleven fights. I feel he’s got the talent, and with time and experience, could become a serious contender for world honours.

Former British champion Paul Appleby made his first appearance since losing his title to Martin Lindsay nearly eighteen months ago. He demolished Yordon Vasilev inside two rounds.

Vasilev was down twice in the opening round after taking a couple of rib crunching shots from Appleby and was stopped in the second after being on the end of a one-sided beating.

Appleby is still young at 23, and I don’t believe it’ll be too long before he’s back in the mix for domestic honours.

Alex Arthur beat Peter McDonagh over eight rounds but looked like a shell of the fighter that won British, Commonwealth, European and Interim world titles. He’s got a lot of hard work ahead of him if wants to scale those heights again.

e-mail Dave Oakes