By Erik Schmidt: World Boxing Council cruiserweight champion Giacobbe Fragomeni (26-1-1, 10 KOs) fought to a disappointing 12-round draw on Saturday night against his Polish challenger Krzysztof Wodarczyk (41-2-1, 31 KOs) at the Gran Teatro, in Roma, Lazio, Italy. The final judges’ scores were 116-112 for Fragomeni, 114-113 for Wodarczyk, and the final judge scored it 114-114. Boxing News 24 scored it 114-113 for Wodarczyk. Fragomeni was knocked down twice in the 9th, but the referee Ian John-Lewis failed to count the 2nd knockdown for some strange reason.

It was clearly a knockdown, though, as Fragomeni took a knee while getting hammered in the corner. This effectively took away a point from what should have been a 10-7 round for Wodarczyk. However, even without the 2nd knockdown counting, Wodarczyk appeared to do enough to get the edge in the final cards.

Unfortunately, it’s never easy for a challenger to beat a champion, especially when they have to travel to the champions’ home country to fight, in this case, Italy. This isn’t the first time that Wodarczyk has been involved with a controversial bout, as his first fight with Steve Cunningham was also a fight that had a strange ending with Wodarczyk, a former International Boxing Federation cruiserweight champion.

Fragomeni, 39, known to many people for his life and death fight with David Haye in 2004 in which he gave Haye all he could handle before being stopped in the 9th, had problems with Wodarczyk in the first three rounds, getting badly outworked by Wodarczyk in each round and hit a lot.

During this time, the 5’9” Fragomeni was at the mercy of the taller Wodarczyk, who bombed away at Fragomeni from the outside with a lot of hard jabs and combinations. Mostly, though, Fragomeni was bothered by the nonstop punches from Wodarczyk as he never seemed to let up for even an instant.

Fragomeni was able to land some short punches during these rounds, but Wodarczyk would always answer back with four to five of his own shots in return.

In the 4th round, Fragomeni stayed in close to Wodarczyk, landing short punches on the inside and making the Polish fighter give up his height and reach advantage. Wodarczyk, a former International Boxing Federation cruiserweight champion for a brief time in 2006, let Fragomeni dictate the distance from where they would fight during the round.

It would have been easy for Wodarczyk to simply back up a couple of steps and resume jabbing the shorter-armed Fragomeni from the outside the way that he had done in the first three rounds, but Wodarczyk seemed to relish exchanging shots with Fragomeni at close quarters, as if he wanted to beat him at his own game.

It wasn’t working out well for Wodarczyk, however, as he continued to have problems on the inside in the 5th round, getting hit often with Fragomeni’s short combinations over and over again. Wodarczyk came back well in the 6th, outworking Fragomeni in the round with nonstop punches on the inside.

Fragomeni was still pressuring Wodarczyk badly, but he was now showing signs of fatigue and was spending more and more time against the ropes.

In rounds seven and eight, Fragomeni was the busier fighter, fighting well with his back against the ropes and landing short punches through the guard of Wodarczyk. Fragomeni looked exhausted, but because of Wodarczyk’s error of fighting him at close range, he wasn’t able to take advantage of Fragomeni’s fading energy.

In the 9th round, Fragomeni resumed his position with his back against the ropes, but this time he made the mistake of lodging himself in the corner where he couldn’t easily escape. Wodarczyk then teed off on him with a series of hard left hooks that sent Fragomeni down on one knee on the canvas.

Fragomeni got up and continued to get hammered in the corner and then intentionally took another knee to escape the punishment. The referee seemed to get confused and ruled that it wasn’t a knockdown, despite there being no slips prior to Fragomeni intentionally taking a knee.

As it was, it allowed Fragomeni to escape the round with only one knockdown instead of two, which ended up allowing him to keep his title in the end when the final judge scored it 114-114.

In rounds 10 and 11, Fragomeni was the busier fighter once again, going back to work on the inside and getting the better of Wodarczyk with short punches. In the 12th, Wodarczyk came on strong and punished the tired Fragomeni for the full three minutes of the round. Like in the previous six rounds, Fragomeni fought with his back against the ropes and looked like an old fighter.

In the end, Wodarczyk should have been given the decision. The referee blew the call in the 9th and missed the 2nd knockdown for some reason. Perhaps he was shielded from the action, but it was clearly a knockdown and messed up and missed it.