By Jim Dower: WBO light heavyweight Sergey Kovalev (24-0-1, 22 KO’s) defeated previously unbeaten challenger Cedric Agnew (26-1, 13 KO’s) by a 7th round knockout on Saturday night at The Ballroom, Boardwalk Hall, Atlantic City, New Jersey, USA. Kovalev’s power was devastating. You’ve got to credit Agnew for having a really tight defense. He was really hard to hit tonight for Kovalev.
It wasn’t until Kovalev started aiming his punches to the body of Agnew that he was able to finally hurt him and get him out of there. Kovalev figured out in the 6th that Agnew couldn’t take the body shots down the middle. From that point it was only a matter of time before Kovalev got Agnew out of there.
Kovalev dropped Agnew three times in the fight. He finished Agnew off with a left to the body in the 7th round. Agnew stayed down for the full 10 round. The official time of the stoppage was 58 seconds of the 7th.
Agnew landed a hard low blow in the 1st round that put Kovalev down on the canvas.
In the 2nd round, Kovalev dropped Agnew with a left hook to the head. Agnew tried to protest that he wasn’t knocked down, but he clearly was.
Agnew responded with some good shots in the 3rd round in catching Kovalev as he was coming forward. However, most of the action came from Kovalev landing big shots. A lot of the punches Kovalev threw was being blocked on the gloves of Agnew, who kept his gloves up in front of him the entire three minutes of the round.
In the 4th round, Kovalev was cut from a head-butt over his right eye. In the 6th round, Kovalev suffered a cut over his left eye. The action was one-way with Kovalev pounding the guard of Agnew and occasionally getting through with hooks to the head.
By the 6th round, Agnew’s face began to swell up from the heavy shots he was absorbing. Agnew was also bleeding from his lips and he didn’t look like he was going to be able to take punishment for too much longer. Early in the round, Kovalev knocked Agnew down with a left to the body. For the remainder of the round, Kovalev teed off on Agnew with nonstop punches. Just when it looked like the referee was going to have to stop the fight, Agnew came alive with a few harmless punches.
In between rounds, Agnew looked terrible with bad swelling over both eyes and swollen reddened lips.
Kovalev threw mostly jabs in the 7th round, and backed Agnew up against the ropes. Kovalev then threw a straight left jab to the midsection of Agnew that send him down on one knee on the canvas. He was then counted out by the referee.
Kovalev said “I found this open place in his defense. More puncher harder, enough of this. I don’t want to speak about Adonis Stevenson. He’s a piece of s**t. I want to get one more title. I’m ready for anyone. This is boxing.”
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