Photo credit: Pavel Terekhov – By Jason Kim: WBC heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko (40-2, 38 KO’s) toyed with challenger Alberto Sosnowski (45-3-1, 27 KO’s) for eight rounds before getting serious in the 9th round and badly hurting Sosnowski with several hard right hands at the end of the round. In the 10th, Klitschko continued to tee off on a tired and hurt Sosnowski, hurting him with a series of right hands, driving him to the corner and then chopping him down with a heavy right hand. Referee Jay Nady stopped the bout at 2:20 of the 10th without even looking back at Sosnowski to see if he was going to get up. He wasn’t. Sosnowski was badly hurt in a heap in the corner after feeling the power from Vitali’s right hands.

In rounds one through eight, Klitschko mostly took his time, landing short left hooks and jabs to keep Sosnowski from doing much. Sosnowski, a fighter used to going to war with his opponents, found himself unable to land with any regularity at all. Oh, he tried to land, but Vitali would either lean back to make Sosnowski’s shots miss or he’d hit Sosnowski with a short left hook that would mess up Sosnowski’s forward momentum. Vitali was able to do this again and again to halt Sosnowski’s progress in coming forward.

Sosnowski missed with a lot of his biggest punches because of the height and reach disadvantage that he had against the 6’7” Klitschko. Sosnowski didn’t come close to winning any of the rounds until the 6th and 7th, when Vitali seemed to look tired all of a sudden. I gave the 6th to Sosnowski because he landed a number of hard jabs, left hands and a couple of hard rights. Vitali almost nothing in that round and looked really tired. The 7th was close, as Vitali dominated the first half of the round with jabs and short left hooks.

However, Sosnowski landed a hurt right hand at the midpoint of the round that got the German crowd cheering for him. It seemed like they were trying to encourage out of sympathy because he had been so badly dominated in five of the first six rounds of the fight. Sosnowski finished the round strong, but I still thought Vitali was more impressive in the first half of the round.

In the 8th round, Vitali went back to dominating Sosnowski, blasting him with short left hooks and jabs. Early in the round, Vitali staggered Sosnowski with a chopping hand to the head that caused Sosnowski to back up. Vitali could have had Sosnowski if he wanted to at that point but instead of going after him, Vitali seemed to let him off the hook purposely to keep him in the fight. However, Vitali continued to pour in hard right hands and left hooks for the remainder of the round. Sosnowski was starting to get beaten up and look tired by this point. Vitali’s jabs were very effective in keeping Sosnowski on the outside. He would try to come in on Vitali but would be met with hard jabs that would keep him from moving forward.

In the 9th round, it was as if was a completely different Vitali. He was no longer just pawing with Sosnowski with his jabs and left hooks. Vitali was now unloading on him with powerful right hands and hard left hooks. The difference in the power in Vitali’s shots were pretty dramatic. It seemed to me that he had been carrying Sosnowski all these rounds to give the 60,000 fans that showed up more of a treat. I guess he knew how badly over-matched Sosnowski was and didn’t want to finish him off too quickly for all the fans that came to see him.

Late in the 9th, Vitali staggered Sosnowski with a chopping right hand that landed to the back of Sosnowski’s head as he was ducking. Sosnowski then backed up to the corner. Vitali followed him, holding his right hand up in the air to get the crowd into it while Sosnowski waited for him. Vitali landed one more crushing right hand to end the round. The punch bounced Sosnowski back against the ropes like a tennis ball. He survived the round but it was clear that he wasn’t going to last much longer.

Sosnowski was desperate at the start of the 10th, fighting for his life and throwing wild right hands with knockout intentions. He missed with most of them but did hit Vitali with a couple. Vitali was no longer thinking defense and was stalking Sosnowski and hitting him with crushing shots. One particularly hard right hand caused Sosnowski to bend forward as if he was going to fall face first on the canvas. However, he stayed upright and retreated quickly to the corner. Vitali met Sosnowski with two hard right hands that collapsed Sosnowski in the corner. Referee Jay Nady immediately waived the fight off and stopped it at 2:20 of the round.

All in all, it was a very impressive performance by Vitali. For those boxing fans that said he wasn’t impressive, that he was looking slow and over the hill, I think they don’t realize that Vitali was toying with Sosnowski until the 9th. That’s really when Vitali started throwing his power shots and quickly took him out. Vitali normally comes out firing away in his fights, but he really took it easy on Sosnowski until the 9th, when he let loose with the power shots. As expected, Sosnowski was now match once Vitali started fighting with knockout intentions.