Ben Davison talks Leigh Wood vs. Mauricio Lara – post fight

By Boxing News - 02/22/2023 - Comments

By Sam Volz: Trainer Ben Davison says his rationale for throwing in the towel to pull Leigh Wood out of his fight against Mauricio Lara last Saturday is that he wasn’t certain that he could properly defend himself after getting up from the seventh round knockdown.

Davison states that Lara (26-2-1, 19 KOs) was standing right behind the referee, and he didn’t know if Wood (26-3, 16 KOs) would be able to fight. At the same time, Davison know that they had the rematch clause they could use to get a second fight.

Davison, Eddie Hearn, and Frank Smith will meet to discuss options for Leigh’s next fight. He says they can either fight Lara in an immediate rematch or face the winner of his trilogy match against Josh Warrington.

“The question running through my head was, ‘Was he able to defend himself?’ If we stood in front of someone and counted for ten seconds, that’s a long time to stand in front of someone if you’re not able to defend yourself,'” said Ben Davison on his Youtube channel about why he threw in the towel to save Leigh Wood in the seventh round last Saturday night in his fight against Mauricio Lara.

“Mauricio Lara was right behind the referee. If the referee had stepped back, I wasn’t certain he would be able to defend himself, and that was a risk that I wasn’t willing to take. I understand it was a huge fight and a world title fight.

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“If I was sure he could defend himself but still a risk of getting caught that’s a different scenario. So I had to take that into consideration. I wasn’t willing to risk that. That’s the reason why I chucked the towel in, which was a big decision, and I’m absolutely gutted about. I do feel it was the right decision.

“I’m taking that into consideration that Leigh had a rematch clause. Taking all these things into consideration, I felt it was the right decision.

“What’s next for Leigh? In the coming weeks, we’ll sit down with Eddie and Frank, and the team. We’ll discuss and look at options. As Eddie mentioned, there is a rematch clause. So we’ll weigh that up, and discuss the options.

“I know the Warrington-Lara fight is a big fight, and there’s the potential of that happening, and Leigh fight the winner of that. We’ll weigh up the options and see what’s next and what makes sense.

“All I can say is Leigh has lost before, and the character and type of person he is, he’s come back better, and I’m confident he can do that this time. This is now the road to two-time. I’m confident in Leigh that he’s capable of doing it, and that’s the new goal set ahead of us,” said Davison.