By Allan Fox: The rematch between Jeff Horn and Manny Pacquiao won’t be taking place at the Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane, Australia. The rematch, if there is one, will likely be taking place at the Brisbane Entertainment Centre in Boondall, according the Courier Mail.
Pacquiao lost to the 29-year-old Horn by a 12 round unanimous decision on July 1 in front of a large crowd of 51,000 boxing fans, with many of them showing their support for the home fighter Horn. If Pacquiao decides on taking a second fight with Horn, he’s going to have to deal with another large crowd of Australian fans rooting against him. The Brisbane Entertainment Centre only holds 15,000 fans compared to the Suncorp Stadium, which can hold as many as 52,000.
The ticket prices will likely increase for the rematch due to the fight taking place in the smaller venue. There’s a potential for really bad weather at the time of the Horn-Pacquiao rematch. Staging the fight outside once again at the Suncorp Stadium could make things messy if the weather turned out to be bad. The Brisbane Entertainment Centre in an enclosed Arena, making it better for the boxing fans in case of bad weather.
The rematch between Pacquiao and Horn will likely occur in November or December. Both fighters were cut in their July 1 fight. Those cuts will need time to heal. Negotiations shouldn’t be too tough as Pacquiao and Horn are both with the same promotional company Top Rank. Horn is co-promoted by Top Rank. Horn’s other promoter is Duco Events.
Pacquiao, 38, was wise to include a rematch clause in the contract for his previous fight with Horn. He’s already said that he plans on fighting Horn again. Anything is possible though. Pacquiao also said that he wants to think about whether to fight Horn again. If Pacquiao decides to continue fighting, it would look bad if he doesn’t face Horn again to try and avenge his defeat. The boxing public wouldn’t hold it against Pacquiao if he retires from the sport, since he’s done enough over his long career for him to get out right now without him taking flak from the fans.
“We could have a really bad storm; we could have a cyclone for all we know. So there’s a lot of risks there in trying to do that so I think the safe option would be to go to Boondall,” said Horn’s trainer Glenn Rushton told Channel 7 via couriermail.com.au.
The World Boxing Organization will be re-scoring the Horn vs. Pacquiao fight. The news won’t change the outcome of the previous results for Horn-Pacquiao fight. Horn will keep the WBO title. It appears the only thing that can come of it is to help clear up the confusion over their fight. The WBO will have 5 judges re-scoring the fight. If the judges view Pacquiao as the winner, it would obviously him look better in the eyes of a lot of boxing fans, who felt that he did enough to earn the win. The judges gave Horn the win by the scores 117-111, 115-113 and 115-113.
One of the reasons why there was so much controversy with the results of the Pacquiao-Horn fight is the punch stats showing that Pacquiao landed twice the amount of shots with a far better connect percentage. That’s the most troubling aspect about the Pacquiao-Horn fight. Pacquiao landed 182 of 573 shots for a connect percentage of 32, according to CompuBox. Horn landed 92 of 625 punches for a connect percentage of 15. Horn was hurt in the 9th round, and he received a warning from referee Mark Nelson at the end of the round. Dan Rafael of ESPN had Pacquiao winning 117-111, and Teddy Atlas scored it for Pacquiao 116-111. Boxing News 24 scored the fight for Pacquiao 7 rounds to 5.
There were a lot of fans that thought Pacquiao was robbed by the judges. Things weren’t helped that the fight took place in Horn’s home country of Australia. Some fans saw as the reason why Horn got the victory. It’s unknown what the judges saw for them to give the win to Horn. He was the more aggressive guy at times, but his punches were missing quite frequently. If the judges were influenced on just activity without accuracy, then that could be a reason why they gave Horn the victory.
The actual punches thrown were so close that the judges couldn’t say that Horn was busier. Horn threw only 52 more punches than Pacquiao in the entire fight. That’s not enough of an edge in activity to justify Horn getting the win on activity. The WBO’s decision to re-score the Pacquiao v. Horn fight seems to be a pointless endeavor. Without them showing interest in wanting to change the outcome of the fight, it would seem like a waste of time. If anything, it might muddy the waters even more if the five appointed judges by the WBO give Horn the victory. I think that would look bad in the eyes of a lot of boxing fans. It would also be a real negative if Pacquiao if given the win, but the results of their July 1 fight aren’t overturned.