By Scott Gilfoid: Promoter Frank Warren is interested in seeing new World Boxing Organization super featherweight champion Ricky Burns (29-2, 7 KO’s) back in action before Christmas. Burns defeated WBO super featherweight champion Roman Martinez (24-1-1, 15 KO’s) by a narrow 12 round unanimous decision on Saturday night at the Kelvin Hall, in Glasgow, Scotland. The margin of victory was pretty close, with the 27-year-old Burns getting the win by the scores of 115-112, 115-112 and 115-113. I’d like to see a rematch in Puerto Rico, because all those screaming Scottish fans, singing songs and chanting incessantly, really seemed to help Burns raise his game. If this fight had taken place in a neutral venue, I think Martinez would have won it. As it was, Burns won the bout by a razor thin margin.
Those are pretty much the same scores I had it, although I think Burns should have penalized two or three times for his pulling down on Martinez’s head during the fight and his headlocks. That kind of thing should have been nipped in the bud by the referee early, but instead he didn’t do anything to prevent Burns from doing this throughout the fight. Other than that, Burns looked pretty good in there. He landed a lot of uppercuts, and Martinez seemed to have no clue on how to stop them.
Martinez looked almost amateurish at times, fighting really sloppily and leaning forward all the time when in close. He was begging for the uppercuts and Burns simply obliged. When Martinez was fighting at a distance, he gave Burns all kinds of problems. But then Martinez would make the mistake of getting too close to Burns and would start punishment from the Scottish fighter. There were no adjustments made by Martinez’s corner. I could see what Martinez was doing wrong, but his corner didn’t seem to be picking up on what Martinez needed to do.
Warren had this to say at his website Frankwarren.tv: “Scotland has a new hero and we will get Ricky back out to defend soon. I’d like Ricky to fight before Christmas. He deserves a few weeks off because that was one hell of a fight, but I’m sure he will be back before too long.”
I’d like to see Burns either back in there with a rematch with Martinez or taking on someone like Roberto Guerrero. Burns barely beat Martinez and a rematch would be nice so that we could see if the win was a fluke thing or not. Burns took a lot of heavy shots in the fight and I think he would take even more punishment in a rematch. I can see Martinez knocking Burns out if they fight again. As it was, he had Burns hurt in the 1st, when he knocked him down with a scorching right hand, and then hurt Burns again in the 7th with a huge left hook to the jaw.
If Martinez can make some adjustments for the rematch, like not getting too close, I can see him beating Burns. I think that’s the fight Warren should be trying to set up. The other contenders aren’t quite as interesting as Martinez, but that’s probably not going to happen. If Burns fights again before Christmas, it will probably be against one of the lower ranked fighters in the top 15. He needs to be fighting Martinez, Guerrero, Urbano Antillon, Sergey Gulyakevich or Vincente Rodriguez.
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