By Sean McDaniel: Super bantamweight challenger Bernard Dunne (28-1, 15 KOs) defeated Panamanian WBA super bantamweight champion Ricardo Cordoba (34-2-2, 21 KOs) in the 11th round in an exciting fight on Saturday night at The O2, in Dublin, Ireland. Dunne, 29, knocked Cordoba down four times in the fight, once in the 3rd and three more times in the 11th. After the third knockdown of Cordoba in the 11th, the fight was stopped by referee Hubert Earle at 2:59.
Cordoba, badly hurt, wasn’t able to get up after the knockdown and had to be helped to his feet and needed to be brought back to his corner by his trainer. Though Dunne won the fight, he didn’t exactly dazzle, getting knocked down twice in the 5th, and took a pounding in the 10th and part of the 11th before hurting Cordoba with a left hook.
The fight arguably should have been stopped in the 5th, because Dunne took a severe beating against the ropes in the last seconds of the round and got hit with no less than 17 consecutive punches to the head without throwing anything back.
However, the fight was in Ireland and the referee, perhaps, was afraid to step in and stop a local fighter without him being flat on his back. As it turns out, it was a good thing, too, because Dunne showed resilience and came back from his disastrous 5th round beating to hurt Cordoba with a left hand in the 11th and put him down with a right hand.
Seconds later, Dunne put Cordoba down again, this time with a big left hook to the head. Cordoba staggered to his feet and looked in really bad shape. However, the referee let it continue a little while longer. Dunne immediately went after the hurt Cordoba and battered him against the ropes with combinations then putting him down with a left hook that caused Cordoba to stagger and then fall to the canvas on his back. Referee Hubert Earle then moved in and halted the bout at 2:59 of the round.
Cordoba dominated the action in the first two rounds, using his fast hand speed and high work rate to keep Dunne on the defensive. Dunne was able to land some good shots of his own, but he was no match for Cordoba’s faster hands and high work rate.
In the 3rd round, Cordoba was landing well and controlling the round until he was dropped by a short left hook by Dunne late in the round. Cordoba was attempting to land a right hand at the time of the knockdown, but Dunne’s short right got there first.
After the round ended, Cordoba staggered back to his corner looking hurt.
Dunne was cut over his left eye in the 4th from a head butt caused when he dove in trying to clinch.
In the 5th, Cordoba hurt Dunne early in the round and put him down with a left-right combinations. A dozen unanswered shots later, Cordoba put Dunne down for the second time in the round from another combination.
Later in the round, Cordoba caught Dunne against the ropes and hit him with a storm of unanswered shots that was sickening. Somehow, Dunne took the shots without sinking to the canvas.
Cordoba was cut over his right eye in the 6th from one of Dunne’s clinches.
In rounds six through nine, Dunne did the better work as Cordoba looked to be tiring out. Still, Cordoba was the busier fighter, landing more but with much weaker shots. Dunne continued to clinch often, mostly after every punch thrown by either fighter.
In the 10th round, Cordoba landed well with a hard body attack for the duration of the round, never letting up on his big body shots for the full three minutes of the round. Going into the 11th, it looked as if Cordoba had gotten his second wind and was on his way to victory.
However, in the 11th, Dunne caught Cordoba with a hard combination, hurting him badly. Dunne then dropped him with a left-right combination a second later. Cordoba got to his feet but his legs were completely gone and he didn’t look good enough to keep fighting.
Dunne then moved in and flattened him with a big left hand to the head. Cordoba was in even worse shape after this knockdown, staggering to his feet and standing with rubbery legs in the corner as he waited for Dunne to come at him for the kill.
Dunne tore into him immediately, landing big hooks to the head before finishing him off with a left hook that staggered Cordoba and sent him down in a delayed reaction. This time, he was counted out by referee Hubert Earle at 2:59 of the 11th.
Dunne did a great job in the fight, but he ruined much of the bout with his constant clinching in every round. Indeed, he clinched after almost every punch that was thrown, which led to a cut over the right eye of Cordoba and cuts over both Dunne’s right and left eyes.
Clinching up to a point is fine, but Dunne seemed to go way overboard using it and it seemed to alter the course of the fight. Without the clinching, I have doubts that Dunne would have won the fight, because Cordoba had the much faster hands, the much better work rate and dominated when he was able to throw without being clinched.
Other than that, Dunne did well using his left hooks to inflict a lot of damage. For his sake, though, he needs to do something about his tendency to clinch all the time because he gets cut in every fight with all of his grabbing and clinching all the time and it’s likely to shorten his career due to all the scar tissue around both of his eyes.
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