Barker stops Hope

By Boxing News - 12/08/2012 - Comments

By William Mackay: Former EBU middleweight champion Darren Barker (24-1, 15 KO’s) blew away Kerry Hope (18-5, 1 KO’s) by a 4th round stoppage on Saturday night at the Olympia, Kensington, London, United Kingdom. Coming back after a 14 month layoff, Barker dropped Hope in the 4th round with a hard right hand.

After Hope got back up, Barker teed off on him with power shots the lead to Hope’s corner throwing in the towel to protect their man.

Barker and Hope fought on pretty even terms in the 1st and 2nd rounds. However, Barker came on in the 3rd round with his hard power shots from the outside. He was catching Hope with uppercuts and hard right hands. Hope had done a good job of keeping the action on the inside in the first couple of rounds, but Barker got on the outside in the 3rd and 4th rounds, and he really dominated Hope with his big power shots.

Hope might have given Barker problems but the power just wants there for Hope. He didn’t have the the tools to get the job done in this fight.

Barker’s promoter Eddie Hearn said after the fight “One more fight in March and then we’re going for a world title.”

Barker’s best chance of getting a world title would be to go after WBO middleweight champion Peter Quillin or IBF champ Daniel Geale. I wouldn’t like Barker’s chance against WBA champion Gennady Golovkin, and we already saw what happened to Barker when he faced Sergio Martinez 14 months ago, so that’s not a good idea that Barker try and fight him again.

Other results on the card:

Khalid Yafai TKO 3 Jorge Perez
John Ryder TKO 8 Eamonn O’Kane
Erick Ochieng UD 10 Max Maxwell
Carson Jones D 8 Dean Byrne
Callum Smith pts 4 James Tucker



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