By Jim Dower: In looking back at least week’s lightweight clash between Amir Khan (20-1, 15 KOs) and Marco Antonio Barrera (65-7, 43 KOs) at the M.E.N. Arena, Manchester, it seems more than a little unfair to Barrera that the fight wasn’t stopped in the first two rounds after a huge cut was opened up above Barrera’s left eye from a head clash late in the 1st round.
With the fight allowed to continue despite a huge amount of gushing blood from the cut in each of the five rounds, it was allowed to continue long enough so that Khan was permitted to win. If the fight had been stopped earlier before the end of the 4th, such as the 1st and 2nd, when arguably it should have been stopped, the fight would have ended in a no contest with neither fighter being given the victory.
Don King, Barrera’s promoter, seems to agree with me on this point and because of that King made an official complaint to the British Boxing Board of Control, WBO and WBA for his fighter, stating that the fight should have been stopped and ruled a no contest after the head clash in the 1st round.
Instead of the fight being stopped when it probably should have in the 1st or 2nd, when it was apparent that Barrera’s trainers couldn’t stop the bleeding of his cut between rounds, the fight was permitted to continue until the 5th when referee Dave Parris finally stopped it at 2:36 of the round.
King feels that the victory for Khan is tainted due to the cut. As it turns out, he’s not the only one because many other fans and writers have said the same thing about the fight. There’s no doubt that Barrera couldn’t see out of his left eye from late in the 1st until the fight was stopped due to the excessive amount of blood that was dripping into his eye.
Not only was the blood dripping into his left eye, but it was also dripping into his right eye as well, causing him to wipe at both eyes trying to get a clear field of vision. It’s quite strange that both the ringside doctor and the referee seemingly chose to ignore the deep cut and let the fight continue until it 5th, which by that time had caused Barrera to bleed all over his trunks, the ring canvas and Khan.
Amir ended up getting the victory, but I have to agree with King, the fight should have been stopped almost immediately after the cut was suffered due to the severity of it. This cut was even worse than the cut that opened up above Barrera’s left eye from a clash of heads in his January 31st against Freudis Rojas.
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