Smith defeats Rebrasse, looks very poor

By Boxing News - 06/26/2015 - Comments

smith7By Scott Gilfoid: #3 WBC Callum Smith (17-0, 12 KOs) was badly exposed tonight in winning a very unimpressive 12 round unanimous decision win over Christopher Rebrasse (23-4-3, 6 KOs) on Friday night to capture the vacant WBC Silver super middleweight title at the Echo Arena in Liverpool, UK. Other than main event, the fight card was filled with mismatches as far as the eye could see. Promoter Eddie Hearn’s A-side fighters all won, but the match-making was just awful to the extreme. It wasn’t even sporting. I’m just wondering where Hearn found all these over-matched B-side fighters.

The judges scores were 118-110, 118-110 and 120-107. The scores were extremely wide and not accurate to the actual took place. I had Rebrasse winning six rounds of the fight. What we learned from this fight was Smith can only throw body punches. He doesn’t have any punching power when he goes to the head. The thing is when Smith thew to the body tonight, he was getting nailed left and right by Rebrasse. Fortunately for Smith, Rebrasse had absolutely no punching power at all, otherwise Smith would have been in deep, deep trouble in the fight.

Smith knocked Rebrasse down with a left hook to the midsection in the 10th. But after that, Rebrasse dominated the remainder of the 10th, and went on to control the 11th and 12th rounds.

Rebrasse controlled the action through the first seven rounds. I had Smith winning two of the first seven rounds. Rebrasse let off the gas in rounds eight through ten, but he picked up again in the last two rounds of the fight.

What was really surprising about the fight was how the light hitting Rebrasse was backing Smith up the entire fight. Smith literally couldn’t hold his ground. Smith was being backed up even in the rounds where he won. His head was getting snapped back violently from Rebrasse’s light punches, and it looked very strange. I think must have a weak neck or something because there’s no way that Smith’s head should have been getting bounced around from the weak punches that Rebrasse was nailing him with.

After the fight, Smith’s promoter Eddie Hearn said that Smith will be getting a No.1 ranking by the WBC after his win over Rebrasse, and he sees him getting a world title shot against WBC champion Badou Jack by next year. But I don’t think it’s going to go well for Smith if/when that time comes. He’s really bothered by pressure, and he can only throw body punches. A pressure fighter like Badou Jack would just decimate a fighter like Smith because he’s got good punching power and he’d nail Smith and over again with vicious head shots until he drops to the canvas.

I rate Callum Smith as just a little bit better than his older brother Paul Smith. They’re both badly flawed fighters.

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#7 IBF super middleweight contender Rocky Fielding (21-0, 12 KOs) defeated 34-year-old middleweight journeyman Brian Vera (23-10, 14 Kos) by a 2nd round stoppage. Vera was knocked down in the 1st and 2nd rounds. The fight was halted at 1:39 of the 2nd round. Referee Ian John Lewis totally blew it by failing to step in after Fielding pushed Vera to the canvas in the 2nd round. Vera got back up and was immediately nailed by a cheap shot left hand from Fielding, and John Lewis called it a knockdown. It was disgraceful. How did the referee not see Vera pushed to the canvas? How does he count a knockdown where I gets pushed down on the canvas, he gets up and then gets knocked down with cheap shot as soon as he gets up? Just a pathetic job by Ian John Lewis.

The magic question is what in the heck was Fielding doing fighting a middleweight instead of someone from his own division? It made no sense at all. I mean, Vera came into the fight with three straight losses, and it wasn’t a big surprise that he was beaten. After all, the guy is a journeyman and he does fight at middleweight.

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In another mismatch on the card, former three time middleweight world title challenger Martin Murray (30-2-1, 13 KOs), who is now fighting at super middleweight, got off to a winning start in his new weight class in beating little known George Beroshvili (19-6-2, 12 KOs) by a 2nd round knockout. Murray isn’t a big puncher, but he didn’t need to be to beat this guy. Murray dropped Beroshvili with a shot to the midsection. The fight was then halted at 2:29 of the 2nd round.

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Cruiserweight Tony Bellew (24-2-1, 15 KOs) defeated replacement opponent Ivica Bacurin (22-8-1, 12 KOs) by a 10th round stoppage. The fight was halted at 1:12 of the 10th. Bellew knocked Bacurin down three times in the fight in putting him down in the 2nd, 5th and 9th rounds. Bellew looked flabby around the midsection. He doesn’t look like his body is made for the cruiserweight division. To me, Bellew looked like a light heavyweight with an extra 20 pounds of fat around his midsection. Bellew needs to lose that flab and move back down to light heavyweight before he gets stretched by one of the good cruiserweights. As of now. Bellew still hasn’t faced one good cruiserweight since moving up in weight last year. I’m just kind of wondering how long Hearn will take before he throws him in with an actual contender with some talent. I’d like to see Bellew prove himself against the likes of at least one of these guys Olesandr Usyk, Rakhim Chakhkiev, Ilunga Makabu, Dmitry Kudryashov, Ola Afolabi or Krzystof Wlodarczyk before he eventually challenges for a world title at cruiserweight. Is that too much to ask?



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