(Photo credit: Ed Diller/DiBella Entertainment) By Dan Ambrose: In a surprise ending, #4 IBF Charles Martin (23-0-1, 21 KOs) defeated #1 IBF Vyacheslav Glazkov (21-1-1, 13 KOs) by a 3rd round stoppage on Saturday night to win the vacant IBF heavyweight title at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York.
Glazkov injured his right knee in the third round somehow. Glazkov slipped on the canvas twice in the round. The fight was halted after the second slip, as Glazkov wasn’t able to continue. The referee counted it as a knockdown on the second slip even though a punch didn’t land.
The fight was officially halted at 1:50 of the 3rd. According to Showtime, Glazkov might have injured his right ACL in his knee.
With Glazkov potentially having a torn ACL in his right knee, it’s pretty impressive that he was able to continue to fight after getting back to his fee from the first slip. It must have been really difficult for him to continue fighting with only one good knee working for him.
Glazkov looked like he didn’t want to continue fighting after the first slip on the canvas. When he got to his feet, his body language showed that he did not feel comfortable in there. Martin seemed to pick up on it immediately. I don’t believe that Martin saw the slip as a real slip. He appeared to react as if he thought he had hurt Glazkov with a punch because he tore into him with hard power shots to the head.
“I still wanted to fight,” Martin said afterwards. “We trained for 12 rounds and we re going to get stronger as the grounds went on. He just kind of twisted his ankle, it looked like. But every time I hit him in the body and his legs were flying. It’s boxing. That was a football injury. I’m sorry for him. It’s unfortunate he couldn’t continue the fight,” Martin said.
Glazkov was bothered by Martin’s shots at the start of the 3rd round, because he came out with so much more aggression than in the previous two rounds. Martin was like another fighter completely once the 3rd started, and the smaller Glazkov just did not seem ready for that kind of a fighter coming at him.
Martin didn’t fight a lot of aggression in the first two rounds, but when he came out for the third round, he was throwing with a lot more punching power. Glazkov seemed bothered by the sudden increase in power from Martin. Glazkov backed off from the early pressure from Martin, but he kept nailed by shots. Moments later, Glazkov’s right leg slipped out from under him when he was exchanging shots with Martin in the center of the ring. After Glazkov got back to his feet, he immediately started backing off from the pressure that was being put on him by Martin. Glazkov’s body language changed completely with him suddenly retreating under the heavy pressure from Martin. It didn’t take long for Glazkov to go down a second time. There was no punch that landed surprisingly. It just looked like Glazkov’s right leg collapsed out from under him when he was trying to throw a punch.
“Unify, I want to fight some more. I didn’t even fight,” Martin said.
If Martin wants to unify, he’s going to have a lot of opportunities, because heavyweight champions Tyson Fury and Deontay Wilder would likely jump at the chance of fighting the 6’5″ Martin.
Martin specifically wants to unify against Tyson Fury first of all. That’s his first target. I’m not sure if he’s going to get that fight because it’s not in Fury’s best interest to go after the IBF title against a little known paper champion like Charles Martin, who doesn’t have a large fan base in the U.S. at this time. If Fury is going to unify the titles, he’ll look to face WBC heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder first, because there’s a lot more money in that fight than there would be for a fight against the 6’5″ Martin.
“I want Tyson Fury,” Martin said after the fight.
Martin will likely need to be satisfied with defending his newly won IBF title against one of his contenders. I don’t expect Martin to be matched against the best available contender because he’s likely going to be directed towards one of the bottom ranked contenders in the IBF’s rankings rather than a dangerous opponent that could potentially beat him straightaway.
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