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It could have been Nedal Hussein’s step into the bigtime, instead it was a hugely disappointing performance by the super bantamweight from Australia who dropped a twelve round decision to reigning WBC champion Oscar Larios. The arena was gaining in electricity |
but Hussein could not find it inside of him to rise to occasion and continually found himself coming last in the exchanges between the two fighters. Truly, Larios has a very awkward style and one that has befuddled many very good fighters and some world champions. But you felt that it was Hussein’s fight to lose, and lose it he did despite the passionate remonstrations of trainer Jeff Fenech. Read on for the story of the fight round by round.
Round one: Hussein looks frozen as he absorbs a lot of punches, he doesn’t seem to have any timing and cannot get any offensive work happening. Larios is busy and comfortably wins the round.
Round two: Hussein wins this round as he looks much more warmed up and ready for the task. Hussein lands some powerful body shots that hurt Larios and some big right hands to the head.
Round three: Larios tries to step up the pace and both fighters land some great right hand shots. Hussein however takes a lot more punches from the champion as he seems intent on stalking Larios down and trying to land one punch that will bring him the title.
Round four: Larios takes this round too as he outworks Hussein who is constantly plodding forward and trying to land the one big punch. Hussein does not begin his work with any jabs. Larios looks good with lots of movement and lands a lot of combinations as he dances in and out of range.
Round five: Hussein jabs a lot more and has the better of the action at the end of the round but it probably isn’t enough to steal him the round as Larios still essentially outworks him.
Round six: Hussein does well by landing some hurtful punches on the champion but his workrate is not that of a challenger seeking a title and Larios is happy enough to steal the round with his busier workrate.
Round seven: This is a messy round. Too few clean shots get through from either fighter. Larios smothers Hussein a lot and Hussein is still not working hard enough and nothing, not even the good advice and passion of his trainer Fenech can raise him sufficiently.
Round eight: Hussein is not putting his punches together and it seems like his fight to lose as he seems by far the stronger fighter but a degree of inexperience seems to be preventing him from doing so.
Round nine: Larios lands a hell of a lot of punches on the challenger. Hussein is never the first to land his shots and cannot get established consistently and is always waiting for Larios to finish his work and gets continually frustrated by the champions style and timing as well as his successful attempts to smother Hussein’s offensive work before it gets started.
Round ten: Larios has a pattern of backing off into a bouncing dance, roaring forward to outwork Hussein inside before backing off out of range again. The champion must be very difficult to fight and his awkwardness if anything has drained Hussein’s confidence. It is a disappointing showing from Hussein to say the least.
Round eleven: Another messy round. Larios is consistently evasive and the fight begins to feel quite inevitable. Larios is coming down the home stretch to retain his championship.
Round twelve: Hussein has one of his best rounds of the fight here and lands a lot of hard shots. It all feels like it is too little and far too late for Hussein who has conceded far too many rounds up until this point.
The final scores are 118-110, 119-109 and 120-108 for the winner and still WBC super bantamweight champion of the world, Oscar ‘Chololo’ Larios.
