The Monday LunchBox

Teak tough unified light-heavyweight champion Artur Beterbiev (20-0, 20 KO’s) from Dagestan, Russia, currently based in Canada, showed his undoubted class and superiority when successfully defending his multiple sanctioning body 175 lbs ‘world’ titles against England’s Callum Smith (29-2, 21 KO’s).

It took place in Quebec City, Canada on an excellent Top Rank show Saturday night (13^th).

Beterbiev, just shy of his 39th birthday, is a former amateur world champion who competed at the London 2012 Olympics, losing to eventual gold medallist and current unified world heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk. On Saturday, he further enhanced his awesome reputation with an emphatic victory.

The stoppage came on 2 minutes of round seven after Smith had been dropped twice in the round and with his chief second James ‘Buddy’ McGirt waving it off, the referee simultaneously stopped the contest. The official result was a TKO.

Smith competed well for the fully completed rounds but was eventually overwhelmed by the Russian’s intensity, momentum and punch accuracy.

The small 18 foot square ring proved no place to hide and almost restricted the rangy Smith to fighting in a telephone booth. The challenger’s body is such that he just couldn’t maximise the benefit of his long limbs to keep the required distance from the champion. After a competitive effort with bravery and some success, most notably rounds two and five, the challenger was simply overwhelmed in the end.

The impressive Beterbiev possesses the only 100% KO record of any current world champion and this was added to on Saturday.

The ‘Beast’ of the division, he is authentically tough, to the extent that he’s almost a ‘throwback’ fighter to a bygone age. This is complimented by his outstanding amateur pedigree, going over 300 fights undefeated and being a former world champion and Olympian in the unpaid code.

Beterbiev was simply too tough and technically sound for Smith to have any real prolonged success. On the fight’s conclusion being interviewed on ESPN, champion Beterbiev humbly paid his respect to his challenger and said amazingly, “It’s because of luck. It’s my coach (Marc Ramsay). My team works hard with me, too. Maybe that’s why, too. But I think it’s because of luck”. His understating of his dominance and nature of victory was refreshing but perplexing.

He continued, “We had a couple strategies. We always have more than one. We need to be prepared for several strategies. He gave me a good fight. He stayed strong. Thanks to him. Today, luck is on my side.

Attention now switches to a unification fight with fellow Russian, Dmitry Bivol (22-0, 11 KO’s) who holds the WBA title (the only one Beterbiev doesn’t yet possess). The taller Bivol is too at the elite level and was The Ring magazine fighter of the year for 2022. A ‘superfight’ potentially awaits and Top Rank CEO and hall-of-fame promoter Bob Arum is confident this will be after Ramadan and held in Saudi Arabia. All of boxing will hold it’s breath that this mouthwatering match comes off soon.

Finally, on being questioned on the prospect of facing his fellow compatriot Beterbiev added “Yes, of course {I want the Bivol fight}. I need another belt. It would mean a lot to me.”

Smith, only 33, from the English fight city of Liverpool, and a former 168 lbs super-middleweight unified champion was not disgraced and his stock was upheld by a brave showing under such firepower and class. He will though return to domestic level for the time being.

The division is red hot in the UK with world ranked Brits facing off and vying for superiority across the board. First up is Joshua Buatsi (17-0, 13 KO’s) against Dan Azeez (20-0, 13 KO’s) scheduled for January 27 in London, England.  There are also good fights to be had between these two, former double world title challenger Anthony Yarde and Manchester’s Lyndon Arthur.

On the undercard on Saturday was also a real ‘barnstormer’ with Australian Jason Moloney (27-2, 19 KO’s) retaining his WBO bantamweight world title with a majority decision over Saul Sanchez (20-3, 12 KO’s) in a back-and-forth tussle. One judge scored it 114-114, which was overruled by two scores of 116-112.

It was a brilliant contest and early contender for fight of the year.