Sloppy Burns Retains Title
Posted by David M. Lee on 06.20.2009
But the Scot fails to impress
In a messy encounter, Coatbridge's Ricky Burns retained his Commonwealth super-featherweight title with a hard-fought unanimous points victory over tough Irishman Kevin O' Hara. Burns (27-2, 7 KOs), fighting in front of a partisan Glaswegian crowd, started off well by his using his superior boxing skills to shade the opening rounds. The game O'Hara (16-5, 5 KOs) made life uncomfortable for Burns however, as the Belfast man rarely went backwards and his aggressive style forced Burns to hold numerous times, which spoiled the action.
In the second half of the contest, Burns spent so much time clinching and leaning on O'Hara that it was a miracle no points were taken from him. Persistent holding is against the rules and referee Terry O' Connor was far too lenient on Burns. Strangely, O'Connor wasn't as forgiving when O'Hara fouled, deducting a point from the Irishman in the ninth for use of the head and admonishing him for low blows that seemed borderline at worst.
The action was scrappy, particularly in the later stages, and the rounds were difficult to score. Burns didn't seem to be working enough to win a lot of the rounds but, at the same time, his holding was preventing O'Hara from being effective. After twelve rounds, I scored the contest 115-113 for Burns. That score mirrored judge Howard Foster's scorecard. However, judges Dave Parris and Victor Loughlin scored the bout 117-110 and 117-111, respectively.
Those margins seemed too wide to me, but as I said, a lot of the rounds were hard to score and obviously Parris and Loughlin were scoring those rounds for Burns. In my honest opinion, I didn't think Burns looked good at all in this fight. Based on this performance, any talk of a potential world title fight with the winner of Roman Martinez and Kevin Mitchell must now be suspended with immediate effect. He's simply not ready for that level yet.
O'Hara, despite losing, comes out of this fight with more credit. Too often the Belfast man has let himself down with poor performances that have cost him points defeats. Against Burns though he put everything into the contest and fought like a man who wanted the victory more. Hopefully he'll get another chance to fight for the Commonwealth title in the near future, assuming Burns vacates.
On the undercard, former WBO super-featherweight champion Alex Arthur (27-2, 20 KOs) returned to action after losing his crown to Nicky Cook last year. Now a lightweight, Arthur looks to be healthier and stronger at the new weight. However, we need to see him in there with a proper opponent before we can gauge what the Scot has left. Because Arthur's facile first round victory over Frenchman Mohamed Benbiou (15-15, 8 KOs) told us very little. Arthur dropped Benbiou three times and the referee mercifully waived off the bout.
