Nickolai Valuev kept hold of his WBA Heavyweight title with a 11th round stoppage over challenger Monte Barrett at the Allstate Arena in Chicago on a Don King promotion. Early on Barrett kept in the fight with the enormous Valuev by basically flinging as many roundhouse shots as he could muster. The technique was successful to a degree but never hurt Valuev, who began to dictate the action midway through the bout.

The eighth round saw Barrett, 31-5 (17), hit the floor but the challenger was in real trouble in the eleventh when Valuev, 45-0 (33), decked him twice. To Barrett's credit, he beat the count both times but after the second knockdown of the eleventh, the New Yorker's corner had seen enough and threw in the towel at 2:12 of the round.

The real firefight of the night came, as expected, during the rematch between WBC Light Heavyweight Champion Tomasz Adamek and challenger Paul Briggs. The two went at it from the start as Briggs, from Australia, floored the champion in the very first round but could not finish Adamek. The Polish fighter battled his way back into contention and just as in the first fight, used his skill advantage to negate the power advantage of Briggs, 25-3 (18). Adamek, 31-0 (21), had a point taken away in the ninth for two low blows but mounted a furious effort in the last round to shade the scorecards and pull out scores of 115-111, 114-112 and 113-113 to take a majority decision victory.

Also on the bill:

Nate Campbell, 29-5-1 (24), decisively won an IBF Lightweight eliminator with a domineering performance against Matt Zegan, 37-2 (21), dropping the Polish fighter in the first and sixth rounds for a unanimous decision.

Former middleweight world champion Keith Holmes, 40-4 (25), defeated the much less experienced Cory Cummings, 15-2 (12), at light heavyweight by unanimous decision.

Irish heavyweight Kevin McBride, 34-5-1 (29), saw any good feelings left over from his victory over Mike Tyson vanish as opponent Mike Mollo,17-1 (11), flattened the "Clones Colossus" in the second round.

Click to read more boxing articles by Richard Eberline

Discuss in Boxing Forum | Send to a friend.

---

Related Boxing Articles...

• Boxing Result: Nickolai Valuev - Jameel McCline

  Massive WBA Heavyweight Champion Nickolai Valuev of Russia retained his belt last night at St. Jakob Halle in Basel, Switzerland, engaging challenger Jameel McCline for three rounds until the American >
  
  

• Valuev - Barrett To Work Out For Boxing Media In Chicago

  Don King Productions is staging their Nickolai Valuev - Monte Barrett WBA Heavyweight title card this Saturday at the Allstate Arena in Chicago and will hold open workouts for this >
  
  

• Boxing Result: Ruslan Chagaev - Nickolai Valuev

  Until yesterday, Russian heavyweight Nickolai Valuev was bearing down on the great Rocky Marciano's longstanding unbeaten record but today the 7 foot tall, 319 pound behemoth is out one WBA >
  
  

• Boxing In Canada: Lucian Bute Wins IBF Eliminator In Montreal

  Last night in front of 10,000 fans at the Bell Centre in Montreal, undefeated super middle southpaw Lucian Bute kept his perfect record by winning an IBF Eliminator with a >
  
  

• European Boxing News: Chagaev, Romanov, Harding, Ragosina

  By Per Ake Persson WBA heavyweight champion Ruslan Chagaev is back in full training, writes Universum in a press release, after the stomach problems that caused the cancellation of >
  
  

• Boxing Result: Joan Guzman - Antonio Davis

  In front of 12,000 screaming fans in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, WBO Super Feather Champion Joan Guzman retained his title with a twelve round unanimous decision win over challenger Antonio >
  
  

• Boxing Opinion: Nikolai Valuev is Still Fighting Bums

  On January 20, WBA Heavyweight Champion Nickolai Valuev steps in the ring with Jameel McCline in Basel, Switzerland. There is no way anyone can be taking Valuev seriously when he >
  
  

• Star Boxing: Commission Rules Rodriguez Now A Winner

  Joe DeGuardia's Star Boxing announced today that the NYSAC reversed the "No-Contest" decision that was declared after the Delvin Rodriguez 21- 2-1 (12KO's) vs Keenan Collins 12-3-1 (8KO's) bout. >
  
  

• Tszyu Suffered Brain Injury.

  Former undisputed champion of the world Kostya Tszyu has worryingly disclosed that he suffered bruising to the brain and internal bleeding as a result of his fight with Ricky Hatton >
  
  

• Calzaghe Defeats Veit…..Again.

  It took a little longer than their first meeting, but the result remained exactly the same. Welsh WBO super middleweight champion of the world Joe Calzaghe took his power to >
  
  

---