Ward Outpoints Kessler!!!!!

[ross]

I did say that Ward might trouble Kessler being that hes not gonna just stand there and trade with him, the southpaw stance and the holding just took any slight momentum Kessler might have picked up.

I knew the fuucking ref would ruin the fight!! Kessler shouldnt have let Ward clinch and butt, he shouldve been able to step back and drop in those right hands but didnt.

Ward might just be able to stink his way to the top now, hes going to ruin what could have been an exciting tournament with his negative style.

The ref should have been taking points away for the holding, making ard think twice about doing it, either that or just throw the little cuunt out, if he cant fight by the rules!!

[markb018]

I see a lot of sour grapes about on here...I did only see 2 butts. 1 in which Kessler brought Ward in and I believe cut the left and then the last one which was pretty nasty, but by no means intentional. Ward by that point had outclassed Kessler. He never got into a rhythm. I watched it on a stream admittedly, there were hundereds of people in the chat, none of them complaining about the butts until one of the announcers said he had seen 5 butts. I did not see them except the 2.

I am definitely going to d/l and watch it again, but for someone who picked Ward to win this tourney from the beginning. I am pretty happy with the result. I find it funny that a fight doesn't go some peoples way and all of a sudden he is over the hill blah blah blah.

[GuyIncognito76]

honestly... how many of the people claiming the headbutts were intentional watched this fight on a >300kbps internet stream?


i have SHOWTIME and watched it on my TV...


the headbutts werent anywhere near blatant

I saw the fight on Primetime TV over here and the last headbutt was deliberate and malicious.

[Pugilistic]

Ward fought a very good fight, He confused Kessler with his mixed attack with either fighting on the backfoot boxing or coming forward in quick bursts.

He also discouraged Kessler with his work on the inside and in the clinches.

Ward's headbutts were completely unintentional also.

People just need to deal with the fact that Ward is better than Kessler.

[Jody Lane]

r u fackers mad, the kid totally outclassed the guy. dude could not fight his way out of a clinch and he could not deal with the speed. End of story.

quick someone cool click me..

ok i added to your rep

[Pugilistic]

Ward is horrible, it's no wonder he appears to be all chummy, chummy with Dirrell. They probably practice ballroom dancing together whilst reciting prayers of god into each others ears.

Ward got the result, but I don't think he was terribly impressive. I was much more impressed with his ability to butt and hold and seldom manage to catch the referees attention whilst doing it. That's some ability right there.

Ward totally dominated the fighter regarded as the best in the tourney, Kessler was a clear favourite going in.

Kessler would of been lucky to win a round of that fight, Ward controlled the fight when he was on the back foot or coming forward, his speed confused Kessler and his in fighting frustrated Kessler.

Ward did clinch but he didn't do it excessively like some folks on here are making out.

Give the guy some credit, he fought a very smart fight.

[GuyIncognito76]

Ward fought a very good fight, He confused Kessler with his mixed attack with either fighting on the backfoot boxing or coming forward in quick bursts.

He also discouraged Kessler with his work on the inside and in the clinches.

Ward's headbutts were completely unintentional also.

People just need to deal with the fact that Ward is better than Kessler.

That's the thing that annoyed me the most; he was winning comfortably and didn't need to resort to these tactics.

He's the boxing equivalent of Dick Dastardly in Wacky Races; race into a huge lead and then start cheating! Unfortunately it didn't backfire on him like it always did on poor old Dick

[hackey]

That was a bit of a strange fight. Ward fought very cleverly, reminded me of Hopkins a lot with his tactics and Kessler could not adjust to it at all.

I have to admit that I thought the reffing was poor. Between continuous clinching by Ward and being allowed to hit on the break several times it made things quite hard for Kessler, but he's a seasoned pro and should have dealt with this better.

As for the butting, there were several clashes in the fight, mostly as a result of Ward wildly lunging in without looking. Kessler should have been more aware of this but in fairness, the one that stopped the fight was an absolute shocker. As biased as the Showtime commentary was, even their commentators said he was like a billy goat. Imo that one was intentional and somewhere else may have meant a DQ. It was even more strange because Ward was a mile ahead on the cards and didn't need to fight that way.

Funnily, I would like to see Calzaghe fight Ward now as it would be interesting to see if Calzaghe could just pick him off.

[ragingbull1985]

Yes, unlike a real fighter who would use his speed to fight, Ward used it to clinch everytime he missed or was closed down. The ref gladly allowed him to butt Kessler 5 times (by accident of course) and only split the fighters once Ward was done hitting in the clinch.

Ward won on cuts

*clap clap clap clap clap*

I agree i personally dont think that much to ward think he is just another dirty fighter who will win world titles but couldnt unify the division, kessler is still the best in the division.

[ragingbull1985]

The one dimentional Kessler was exposed by a 20 fight novice , takes away the shine of a certain Mr Calzaghe's best win dont you think guys ?

No offence but calzaghe was the best boxer in this division for years, lets not forget that jeff lacey was one of the most feared boxers in the division and calzaghe made him look very stupid, kessler got screwed by a bad referee.

[Mar]

Wow awesome night!!! Me and the wife are stayin over in Oakland and goin to the raider game so I haven't seen the fight on tv yet so I can't really comment yet fairly. But from what we saw ward beat that man's ass yet added in a lot of unecessary holding and butting and stuff and I'm still not really sure why. He still would've beat him easy I think. Man kessler sure looked scary as shit before the fight. I started to almost feel sorry for ward. But ward looked so calm. Sorry for any bad writing can only get a signal outside and I &@$" freaking freezing. This game looks like a bad idea and I'm almost out of smoke....

[GuyIncognito76]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SvWLoWdXJao

The headbutt that leads to the stoppage is replayed at 4:43 but you see an earlier headbutt at the beginning of the clip, and despite what the commentators say, that looks deliberate as well. It's certainly an unnatural head movement!

[JT Rock]

Kessler is just a classic fundamentally sound european fighter. I think Kess didnt Jab enough, I know Ward had excellent movement and seemed to really lack respect for Kesslers punching power which no doubt surprised the Dane. Ward exploited the fact that Kessler starts off slow and Andre never took his foot off the gas and managed to hit overdrive the whole fight.. I think the rough stuff on the inside was very smart and no doubt unnerved Kessler and wore on him. I dont think he was in danger of ever being stopped seemed to have his legs and crisp punching still and even seemed to come alive a bit in round 9-10.

I just think a Classic fighter like Kessler cant make the adjustments on the inside and cant compete or dosent know how to when it gets rough

Ward was very versatile and gave Mikkel a ton of different looks, he pressed, counterpunched, orthodox stance, southpaw, fought on the inside/ outside and he never took a second of any round off..

I think the last headbutt was pretty shitty.. Ward dosent have the rep of being a dirty fighter and the previous Butts didnt look intentional at all to me and I'm not a fan of either guy. The fight wasnt decided on the inside, Ward outboxed Kessler from the 1st bell and to say this fight came down to bad officiating is just despicable and most of the complainers on this thread are the usual culprits that tend to side with their half of the world

Kessler controlled 0 in this fight, if Kess was outboxing Ward on the outside then I would agree with you 10000000000000000% that the officiating was horrible but Ward was eating him alive on the outside as well as attacking and pressing most of the fight. Kess got outclassed in every which way shape and form...

I will say though Ward couldnt break an egg and I would highly favor Kess in a rematch, He didnt take Ward seriously, you could tell he wasnt prepared and was reveling in the status of heir apparent of this tournament and to me that was 50% of his demise, I think he would make the adjustments settle down, his punches had plenty of steam on them even in the 10th.

__________________

[Kel]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SvWLoWdXJao

The headbutt that leads to the stoppage is replayed at 4:43 but you see an earlier headbutt at the beginning of the clip, and despite what the commentators say, that looks deliberate as well. It's certainly an unnatural head movement!

The ref had clear view of it and did fuck all.

[killersheep]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SvWLoWdXJao

The headbutt that leads to the stoppage is replayed at 4:43 but you see an earlier headbutt at the beginning of the clip, and despite what the commentators say, that looks deliberate as well. It's certainly an unnatural head movement!

That first one on the clip didn't look deliberate to me at all, unless you think Ward has an eye in his ear or some kind of bat sonar.

The second one was bad. I admit that. I would like to see both Dirrell and Ward clinch a whole lot less, because I think their speed makes it unnecessary. I know both guys have been rocked pretty hard prior to the tournament, so that may play a factor. Not trying to justify it, just trying to understand it.