By Scott Gilfoid: In a nice little robbery, super middleweight Rocky Fielding (22-1, 12 KOs) won a highly controversial 12 round split decision win on Saturday night against Christopher Rebrasse (24-5-3, 6 KOs) at the Echo Arena in Liverpool, England. The final judges’ scores were 114-113, 114-113 for Fielding, and 115-113 for Rebrasse.
I had Rebrasse winning 8 rounds to 4. Rebrasse dropped Fielding in the 2nd round with a beautiful left-right combination to the head. Moments before that, Rebrasse had hurt Fielding with two straight right hands to the head that sent him scurrying for the ropes where Rebrasse then flattened him.
I guess Rebrasse should have gone for broke after knocking Fielding down in the 2nd round. If he had made sure that the fight didn’t go to the cards, then he wouldn’t have had to worry about being on the receiving end of a controversial decision.
It’s just so, so sad when you see gawd awful scoring of a fight like we saw tonight. Poor Rebrasse. He totally dominated Fielding, and yet he has to go home the loser. Fielding was really nailing Rebrasse with textbook forearms in the 12th. I’m surprised he didn’t lose points. If it had been me judging the fight, Fielding would have lost points big time for those forearms.
This was not a good performance from Fielding if you ask me. Seeing him dropped and pummeled by Rebrasse in the 2nd, it looked really bad. It wasn’t just the 2nd round in which Rebrasse was working Fielding over. I counted eight rounds where he was giving him the business. When you combine the eight rounds that Rebrasse clearly won with the knockdown he scored in the 2nd round, it should have been more than enough for him to get the win. I’m just wondering what the two judges were thinking that scored the fight for Fielding. Where the judges confused at which fighter was Fielding and which was Rebrasse? That would explain the reason why the judges gave the fight to Fielding rather than to the guy that appeared to easily win in Rebrasse.
It seemed like each time that Rebrasse would start unloading combinations, Fielding would wilt and just take horrendous punishment. I mean, there was no defense at all with Fielding, as he was getting clubbed over and over again by Rebrasse. Yeah, I saw some rabbit shots that Rebrasse was landing that should have led to the referee warning him, but it was that kind of a fight. The referee wasn’t saying much about Fielding’s forearm shots, and he wasn’t saying much about the punches to the back of the head that Rebrasse was landing from time to time.
You hate to see a fighter like Fielding win a fight that he appeared not to deserve. It looks so awful to watch a guy win a fight that he appeared to lose. Believe me, it’s not going to help Fielding’s career for him to be giving gift decisions in fights he should have lost. Fielding is going to be just as flawed and over-matched when he steps it up again as he was last November when he was halted in the 1st round by Callum Smith. The judges can screw up and give Fielding wins he arguably didn’t deserve, but he’s going to be just as much over-matched when he does finally step it up as he was last year against Smith.
I hope for Fielding’s sake, he takes a good hard look at the replay of tonight’s fight against Rebrasse so that he’s not under any illusion about what really took place tonight. Fielding lost the fight in my view, and it would be better for him to see the fight as a loss so that he can go back to the drawing board and try to figure out what he can do to turn things around with his pro career. Whether he wants to admit it to himself or not, Fielding has now lost back to back fights, and it’s starting to look kind of bleak for him. There were some boxing fans that were thinking that Fielding was the best thing since sliced bread after his win over journeyman Brian Viloria last year. My guess is those same fans are now seeing Fielding as a flawed guy without any hope to improve.
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