ARTUR BETERBIEV beat Dmitry Bivol via a controversial majority decision last night.
The hulking 39-year-old claimed Bivol’s WBC, IBF and WBO belts to become undisputed light heavyweight champion.
The result has since been hotly contested, with “disgusted” promoter Eddie Hearn labelling the judges’ scorecards an “absolute joke”.
One judge scored the contest a 114-114 draw, while the other two had it 115-113 and 116-112 in favour of Beterbiev.
Punch stats compiled by CompuBox, however, show just how close many of the rounds were.
In eight of the 12 rounds, the pair were separated by four or fewer punches landed.
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While Beterbiev threw a far greater volume of shots, Bivol was more accurate over the course of the 12 rounds.
Beterbiev landed 137 of 682 punches thrown, at an accuracy of 20 per cent.
Bivol, meanwhile, landed 141 of 417 shots attempted, giving him a 34 per cent accuracy.
Among those to criticise the final result was Saudi supremo Turki Alalshikh.
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After the bout, he vowed to put on a rematch, telling DAZN: “This was one of the great fights of the last 20 years I think, but I don’t think the result was fair, in my opinion.
“The two fighters are like my brothers, but I think Bivol won two rounds more. I will focus and I will try to do the rematch.
“If they accept, we will do it.”
Even Queensberry promoter Frank Warren agreed with his Matchroom rival Hearn that the scorecards weren’t right.
He said: “I gave it to Bivol by a couple of rounds. That score of 8-4 is beyond ridiculous. Everyone around that ring thought Bivol had won it by at least two rounds.
“There should be a rematch because it was such a quality fight. Brilliant skills in there by Bivol, his jab was superb. Artur the last couple of rounds was told it was sink or swim.
“The score 8-4 was a joke. It’s terrible when you get a fight like that and it ends in controversy.”
Source: Boxing - thesun.co.uk
