By Jim Dower: IBF super middleweight champion Carl Froch (30-2, 22 KO’s) came out on top tonight in stopping challenger Yusaf Mack (31-5-2, 17 KO’s) in the 3rd round in Nottingham, UK.

Froch hit Mack with three hard punches with two of them being debilitating body blows that sent Mack down on all fours on the canvas. He tried to throw a hard left hook just before collapsing on the canvas but Froch easily leaned back to avoid the shot.

Mack never showed any indication that wanted to get back up and the fight was then stopped at at the 2:30 mark.

Froch’s heavy hands had Mack at his mercy from the opening round, because each time he’d open up with a salvo of shots he had Mack looking unsteady. Froch put Mack down in the 1st round from a left hand to the head. In the 2nd, Froch hurt Mack with a blizzard of punches to the head in the last seconds of the round.

In the 3rd, Froch put the finishing touches on the night by hitting Mack with two hard body punches that put him down for the count.

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Fighting with a nasty cut over his right eye from the 3rd round on, Tony Bellew (19-1, 12 KO’s) won the vacant WBC light heavyweight title with a 12 round unanimous decision win over Roberto Bolonti (30-2, 19 KO’s). The final judges scores were 120-106, 119-107 and 120-106. Bellew took the fight out of Bolonti by knocking him down in the 1st and 3rd rounds. After those knockdowns, Bolonti went into a defensive shell where he threw few punches and mostly just looked to defend shots from the much bigger Bellew.

Bellew looked good and you’d have to give him a shot at beating WBC light heavyweight champion Chad Dawson when and if Bellew gets the fight with him.

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Undercard boxing results:

Khalid Yafai TKO 1 Antonio Nettuno
Scotty Cardle UD 8 Miguel Aguilar
Kerry Hope pts 6 Norbert Szekeres
Leigh Wood pts 4 Dai Davies
Callum Smith pts 4 Dan Blackwell
Martin Joseph Ward pts 4 Dan Carr
Konrad Dabrowski pts 4 Kristian Laight