By Chris Williams: Undefeated number #4 ranked World Boxing Association super featherweight Urbano Antillon (24-0, 17 KOs) was too much for his Nigerian opponent Daniel Attah (24-5-1, 8 KOs) on Friday night, stopping him in the 4th round of a scheduled 10-round bout to win the vacant WBO NABO super featherweight and vacant NABF super featherweight titles at the Isleta Resort & Casino, in Albuquerque, New Mexico. After knocking Attah down once in the 3rd round, Antillon, 26, put away him away in the 4th round with two powerful left hooks to the head, sending Attah down to the canvas where he was counted out at 1:13 of the round by referee Rocky Burke.
Antillon, who was coming off a disappointing performance in his last bout against Jose Leonardo Cruz in June, started off slowly against Attah in the first round, getting badly outworked by the Nigerian fighter. It looked for the most part like Antillon was going to have another off night. However, he greatly picked up his pace in the second round by pinning Attah to the ropes, keeping him there and working him over with powerful series of head and body shots thrown with maximum power in each shot. Attah, fighting for survival, landed some good head shots of his own while getting tagged by Antillon. However, he couldn’t match the power or the intensity of the shots Antillon was hitting him with, and he looked decidedly uncomfortable under the strain of Antillon’s attacks.
As the round progressed, Attah threw fewer and fewer punches until finally he was only covering on the ropes, helpless to stop Antillon who was beating him unyieldingly with his powerful fists. It didn’t like the fight would go long, whether that because of the referee stepping in and halting the fight or Attach giving in and taking a knee, ala Miguel Cotto, to escape the beating. In the 3rd round, the one-sided beating continued as Antillon tagged Attah over and over again with big lefts to start the round. Before long, Attah went down after getting hit with two successive left hands to the midsection.
He got up, went to his corner and stood there covering up while Antillon beat upon him for the remainder of the round. In the 4th round, Attah quickly retreated to the ropes to make his last stand. Antillon followed after him, tagging him first with right hands and then with left hooks to the head, sending Attah down for the second time in the fight. This time, the fight was stopped by referee Rocky Burke who had seen enough.
Attah had no business being in the ring with Antillon and if the fight were to have been allowed to continue, Antillon would have possibly seriously hurt Attah. For a fighter only 5’6”, Antillon has a lot of power, especially on the inside where he is murderous with his body attacks. Right now, I’d give him an excellent chance at beating champions Edwin Valero and Nicky Cook.