Stieglitz stops Abraham! Helenius defeats Sprott

By Boxing News - 03/23/2013 - Comments

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By Jim Dower: Robert Stieglitz (44-3, 25 KO’s) has pulled off a huge upset in stopping WBO super middleweight champion Arthur Abraham (36-4, 28 KO’s) by a 4th round stoppage on Saturday night. The fight was halted at the start of the 4th round due to Abraham’s left eye closing completely at the GETEC Arena, Magdeburg, Sachsen-Anhalt, Allemagne, Germany.

The eye swelling was caused from a punch in the 2nd round.

Stieglitz looked bigger and stronger, and he came out on fire. He was lighting Abraham up like he was looking to KO Abraham within the first two rounds. To be sure, Stieglitz looked to be tiring a bit by the 3rd round as he unloaded everything but the kitchen sink on Abraham, but the fight basically won due to the damage he did to Abraham’s left eye.

Abraham made a huge mistake of just covering up and waiting for Stieglitz to stop throwing throwing punches.

Abraham’s bad habit of just covering up and waiting for his opponents to stop punching caught up with him again, as it allowed Stieglitz to smash him at will with a rain of shots. While Abraham did do a good job of picking off a lot of the punches on his gloves, he was still hit with a ton of punches that leaked through his gloves, and he should have recognized that he needed to start throwing punches back. Abraham held back for three rounds and only offered up a handful of shots.

The best punches that Abraham landed were rabbit punches while in a clinch with Stieglitz. Abraham’s rabbit punches eventually led to him losing a point in the 3rd round, but by then he had more to worry about then just a point loss. His eye was rapidly closing and there was no way he was going to be able to go the full 12 rounds.

The way that Abraham’s left eye closed it’s possible that he may have a broken bone around his eye. If so, we won’t be seeing him back in the ring with Stieglitz or anyone else for a long time depending on how bad the damage is.

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Undefeated heavyweight Robert Helenius (19-0, 11 KO’s) booked his ticket for a title shot against WBO heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko by defeating Michael Sprott (37-20, 17 KO’s) by a 10 round unanimous decision

The judges’ scores were 98-93, 97-93, 98-93. Sprott had the jab and the power to win the fight, but he just didn’t seem willing to let his hands go. It looked like Sprott was worried about the counter shots from Helenius that he was getting hit with.

When Sprott would attempt to throw big shots, he’d end off balance and would get tagged in return by Helenius. Sprott was able to take Helenius’ power and it’s disappointing that he didn’t try harder because he could have given Helenius a lot of problems if he had unleashed some big shots.

Dereck Chisora was able to get the better of Helenius by unloading on him on the inside where it was clear that Helenius had zero ability. Sprott wasn’t able to do that. Instead of fighting on the inside and taking advantage of Helenius, he let him clinch each time they’d get close.

After the 8th round, Sprott’s trainer angrily told him that he’d done with Sprott, but even that failed to motivate his fighter into throwing more punches.

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Unbeaten super middleweight contender George Groves (18-0, 14 KO’s) simply annihilated his opponent Baker Barakat (37-14-4, 25 KO’s) in the 2nd round of a stay busy fight. Groves put the 34-yuear-old Barakat down with two right hands to the head in the 2nd. The fight for all practical purposes was over at that point, but Barakat got back to his feet and took four more thudding shots to the head causing the referee to stop the fight.

Karakat could have continued fighting but with the way he was getting with huge uppercuts and right hands from Groves, it’s understandable why the referee chose to end the fight rather than let the slaughter continue. Groves was hitting Barakat at will from the 1st round, and it was only a matter of time before he stopped him.

For Groves, it was a good performance. He’ll back in again action on May 25th on the undercard of the Carl Froch vs. Mikkel Kessler fight in London, UK.

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Other boxing results:

Edmund Gerber UD 8 Gbenga Oloukun
Enrico Koelling UD 6 Josef Obeslo
Moritz Stahl UD 4 Jozsef Orsos
Lukas Konecny TD 12 Karim Achour
Melissa McMorrow SD 10 Nadia Raoui



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