By Adam Baskin: WBO light welterweight champion Josh Taylor (19-0, 13 KOs) and #5 Jack Catterall (26-1, 13 KOs) have reportedly agreed to terms for a rematch in early next year on February 4th in the UK. The fight will be shown on ESPN+ in the U.S.
Mike Coppinger is reporting the news of the Taylor vs. Catterall fight being agreed on for February.
Instead of the rematch being for all four belts, it’ll just be Taylor’s lone WBO title, as he’s since vacated his IBF, WBA & WBC belts after defeating Catterall by a questionable 12 round split decision last February in Glasgow, Scotland.
Taylor won by the scores 114-111, 113-112, and 113-112 for Catterall. However, many boxing fans felt Catterall deserved the victory.
It’s too bad that fans must wait until February before seeing the rematch, as that’s an entire year from the time Taylor beat Catterall, 29 in February 2022. It can’t be good for either fighter to be out of the ring for 12 months.
“Taylor came out with the exact same game plan from round one to the end of the fight,” said Shawn Porter to the Porter Way Podcast about how Josh Taylor fought Jack Catterall.
“Josh Taylor is more athletic than this Catterall guy, and we’ve seen in his past fights that he has more in his arsenal than he showed. But from the opening gunshot, he wasn’t able to get out of the blocks.
“He was lunging in with his jab, and he was pumping his jab. This is a ‘I hope I touch you jab.’ He’s lunging in; he’s coming in too close. I saw so many errors, and at the same time, I saw so many things that I knew that he could do so much. It was like just one of those nights.
“I don’t think Taylor made any adjustments at all. You get knocked down in the fight. The referee was too into everything that was going on. He was the co-star in the fight.
“While I was listening to the commentary afterwards, I agreed with Tim Bradley. I’m not going to give him [Taylor] a pass. At the same time, I agreed with Andre Ward.
“You can’t just write him off. Yes, you can take him out of the top five if you had him in the top five. But as fighters, we know that these are nights that we never want people to see.
Josh Taylor and Jack Catterall have agreed to terms for a Feb. 4 rematch in the U.K. for Taylor's 140-pound championship, sources told ESPN. Taylor defeated Catterall via controversial split-decision when they met in February. Bout will be streamed on ESPN+ stateside
— Mike Coppinger (@MikeCoppinger) October 17, 2022
