By Scott Gilfoid: Last March boxing fans got the impression that Terence Crawford (23-0, 16 KO’s) could walk on water after his 12 round unanimous decision win over WBO lightweight champion Ricky Burns at the Scottish Exhibition Centre, in Glasgow, Scotland, United Kingdom. Crawford dominated Burns in beating him by the scores of 116-112, 117-111 and 116-112.
Burns looked frightened and unwilling to mix it up until the last 3 rounds of the fight when he was already buried on the scorecards to the point where he pretty much needed multiple knockdowns or a knockout to win. Crawford’s big win over Burns is no longer being seen as a huge deal after little known fringe contender Dejan Zlaticanin (19-0, 13 KO’s) did the same thing to Burns in beating him by a 12 round split decision last Friday night at the Braehead Arena, in Glasgow, Scotland, United Kingdom.
Zlaticanin won by the scores of 115-113, 115-113 for Zlaticanin and 115-113. The one judge that gave the fight to Burns was John Keane from the UK. If Burns hadn’t run from Zlaticanin all night, we likely would have seen scorecards far more lopsided than the ones that Crawford was given in beating Burns last March, and that’s if Burns would have been able to make it the full 12. I have serious doubts that Burns would have made it more than 5-6 rounds if he wasn’t running and holding 24/7 in the Zlaticanin fight.
Burns was much more defensive and unwilling to exchange against Zlaticanin than he was in the Crawford fight, and that obviously was because Zlaticanin kept bouncing huge left hooks off the head of Burns in the fight. Burns was dropped in the first 30 seconds of the 1st round by a scorching left hook to the head. After trying to mix it up with Zlaticanin a couple of other times in the same round and getting tagged by equally hard left hooks to the head, Burns went into a shell and fought like a turtle for the remainder of the fight.
The rounds he did win were because he was hitting, running and holding. There was no way at all that Burns would have been able to win rounds if he had stood in front of Zlaticanin the way he did against Crawford, because he couldn’t handle Zlaticanin’s body punching and left hooks to the head.
So what we’ve learned from last night is that Crawford, although superior to Burns, really didn’t accomplish a whole heck of a lot in beating him. I mean, if a guy like Zlaticanin was able to dominate Burns and turn him into a runner for 12 rounds, it kind of puts less of a shine on Crawford’s win.
Crawford will be fighting former IBF/WBA featherweight champion Yuriorkis Gamboa (23-0, 16 KO’s) tonight in what could be Crawford’s last fight at lightweight. He wants to move up to 140 after tonight. The Crawford-Gamboa fight will be taking place at the CenturyLink Center, in Omaha, Nebraska, USA. This fight has to be seen as a 50-50 affair in light of Zlaticanin doing a better job against Burns than Crawford did. If the shorter Gamboa can bounce hooks off of Crawford’s head the way Zlaticanin did against Burns, we could see an upset tonight.
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