By Scott Gilfoid: In a fight filled with ugly clinching, #1 WBC Martin Murray (29-1-1, 12 KOs) defeated #7 WBC Domenico Spada (39-6, 19 KOs) by a 7th round technical decision on Saturday night at the Salle des etoiles in Monte Carlo, Monaco.
The fight was halted in the 7th due to a cut on the side of Spada’s right eye, which was caused by a head-butt by Murray in the 3rd round. Murray was docked a point in the 3rd for the head-butt. The final judges’ scores were 67-66, 68-63 and 69-67.
I agreed with the 67-66 score, as I had scored very close at the time the ring doctor decided to pull the plug on the fight. The official time of the stoppage was 1:19 of the 7th.
Murray didn’t impress with his power, but he sure did a great job of tying Spada up all night long each time he tried to get his shots off.
Murray threw a lot of jabs and power shots, but he lacked power to do anything. He was throwing shots, but the power just wasn’t there. Murray was warned for head-butts during the fight. The referee also told Murray to stop holding, because he was tying Spada up each time he’d try to work on the inside, and all the clinching made the fight nearly unwatchable.
The stoppage prevented the fight from being conclusive. Neither guy had shown that they were better than the other one.
With this win, Murray retains his WBC Siler middleweight title. He could possibly face WBA Super World middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin next in February, although nothing is definite about that fight.
As mediocre as Murray looked in this fight, I’m not sure that he’d be a good opponent for Golovkin. I think it would be better for Golokvin to face someone who doesn’t hold as much as Murray, and someone with power. Murray was throwing shots tonight, but he just didn’t have any strength on his shots. His head-butts were his best weapon in the fight.
Murray is going to have to fight a heck of a lot better than this if he doesn’t want to get completely wiped out by Golovkin next February. Golovkin would have feasted on Murray if he were in the ring with him tonight. Murray is going to take a beating against Golovkin unless he can find some power somewhere by the time he steps inside the ring with him. Right now, Murray would be a punching bag for Golovkin. If Murray does go distance with Golovkin, he’ll have to take some enormous punishment.
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Undefeated #1 IBF Randy Caballero (22-0, 13 KOs) badly outclassed a game but limited Stuey Hall (16-4-2, 7 KOs) in defeating him by a 12 round unanimous decision to capture the vacant International Boxing Federation bantamweight title. The judges’ scores were 116-111, 116-111 and 118-110. Caballero knocked Hall down with a beautiful left-right combination in the 2nd round. From there, Hall attempted to rally, but he missed a massive amount of punches. He also smothered his own work by crowding Caballero on the inside.
Other boxing action on the card:
Hekkie Budler UD 12 Xiong Zhao Zhong
Eleider Alvarez TKO 7 Ryno Liebenberg
Sergey Khomitsky Draw 6 Nick Blackwell
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