By Scott Gilfoid: In a perfect example of a fight that should have never been made in the first place, British and Commonwealth middleweight champion Billy Joe Saunders (17-0, 10 KO’s) totally dominated the much, much smaller Matthew Hall (25-7, 16 KO’s) in beating him by a lopsided 12 round unanimous decision on Thursday night at the York Hall, Bethnal Green, London, United Kingdom.

The final judges’ scores were 120-108, 120-109 and 119-110. You can’t learn much from mismatches like this because differences in size and talent were just too far apart. Saunders, 23, needs to be put in with better opposition than this because this is a backwards step from his last fight agaisnt Nick Blackwell, who made Saunders look horrible last December.

Saunders was unloading on Hall from start to finish in 12 mostly one-sided rounds. Hall took too long to work himself into position to throw punches due to his lack of height, but when he would get in close he wouldn’t throw enough punches. The punches that Hall did throw lacked power, and it was clear that he doesn’t belong at 160, especially a good that looks like a super middleweight like Saunders.

Hall was hurt in the 10th when Saunders unloaded everything but the kitchen sink to try and get him out after trapping him against the ropes. It didn’t work, and Saunders ended up punching himself out and needing to take the 11th round off.

Hall, 5’7 ½”, didn’t have the height or the weight to compete against the 6’1” Saunders and it looked like a guy fighting a smaller guy two divisions below him. Let’s be real about this, Saunders is a super middleweight at this point in his career, and I can’t see him staying at 160 for too much longer.

His promoter Frank Warren said after the fight that he’d like to see Saunders move up to 168 because he feels he’d be more effective at that weight. Saunders will have no other choice once he starts facing quality opposition because he’s going to be too weak to fight at 160 against good fighters due to the hard work that he has to put in to get down to 160. Warren wants Saunders to go after the EBU middleweight title next. Good luck doing that because the EBU champion is Max Bursak, and he’s like a bigger and better version of Matthew Hall.

I can’t see Saunders winning a world title at middleweight or super middleweight. He lacks power, and he seems to tire early in his fights. Tonight, Saunders looked to be gassing after the 4th round against a guy that was just mostly following him around without letting his hands go.

Other boxing results on the card:

Bradley Skeete pts 10 Peter McDonagh
Billy Morgan pts 6 Dan Carr
John Dignum pts 4 Kieron Gray
Tom Baker pts 4 Jason Ball
Simon Vallily pts 4 Simeon Cover
Paul Butler pts 4 Anwar Alfadli