By William Mackay: If you like to watch two fighters go at it for 12 rounds without much in the way of defense then Wednesday night’s bout between British featherweight champion John Simpson (22-8, 9 KO’s) and challenger Stephen Smith (12-0, 6 KO’s) was for you. Smith, 25, won the fight by a 12 round decision at the Olympia, in Liverpool, England. The final judge’ scores were 118-112, 115-114 and 114-114.

This was the second fight between the two with Smith defeating Simpson by a 12 round split decision last year in September. Like that fight, tonight’s bout was really hard to pick an actual winner. Smith got the better of the action while in close and landed some nice combinations to outwork Simpson. However, Simpson landed with some scorching shots when he was given room to get his punches off and Smith showed little in the way of head movement to get out of the way of Simpson’s punches.

After the fight, Simpson was less than pleased that he had lost the bout, saying in an article at the BBC “I believe I won both fights. I’ve beaten him twice now and we move on. I won that fight and I won it in Scotland, nothing against him but I won that fight.” I have to agree with Simpson. I thought he landed the more telling blows and was the better overall fighter of the two. However, Simpson needs to move on because he’s had some bad luck in these two fights and it might be a waste of time to attempt a third fight.

In other action on the card, unbeaten heavyweight prospect David Price (10-0, 8 KO’s) destroyed Rafael Butler (26-8, 17 KO’s) in a 1st round KO, knocking the 27-year-old Butler down twice with sledgehammer shots to the head. This was a big step up for the 6’8″ Price and he passed the test with flying colors tonight. Price dropped Butler with a huge right hand to the head in the opening seconds of the fight. Butler, looking hurt, got back to his feet and attempted to continue fighting. Price then knocked Butler down again with a big shot. This was the final knockdown, as the fight was then halted at 1:47 of the round.

Butler was a former sparring partner for Vitali Klitschko in the past. Tonight, he was no match for Price. With this win, Price will move forward to a June 11th fight against big John McDermott. A win over McDermott would be huge for Price and might put him in the thick of things in the world heavyweight rankings.