Smith started the fight early in a defensive posture, and that allowed Alvarez to likely put numerous early rounds of the fight in the bank.
Advertisement
The Mexican boxer knew he landed the ideal shot when he rocked Smith with a powerful left hook to the body before proceeding to walk straight to his corner before climbing the ropes and reaching out to accept the applause of the 51,420 fans in attendance at AT&T Stadium.
“We know what Liam brings, it’s a very tough fight but that’s what we prepare for”, Alvarez said at the pre-fight news conference with Cowboys owner Jerry Jones front and center at his showplace stadium where less than a sellout crowd is expected. I don’t fear no man.
Alvarez dropped him for the second time in the ninth round with a crunching left hook to the body late in the round. It was more of a give and take scenario but Alvarez was piling up and winning on points round by round until the seventh round when the Mexican star scored a knockdown with two successive right hooks.
Smith’s three brothers are all professional boxers; his younger brother Callum is also a British champion and has been earmarked as a future world champion, and his older brothers Paul and Stephen are also former British champs and world title challengers.
Canelo is dropping down to light-middleweight after he chose to give-up the WBC middleweight belt that he won off Khan, rather than fight Gennady “GGG” Golovkin. “I could land nothing clean and he was too good for me on the night”.
“In the second round I hurt my right hand, so I had to use my left more”.
The 26-year-old Mexican effortlessly dethroned Smith for the WBO junior welterweight championship by delivering a punishing blow to the body in the ninth round. “I didn’t want to say anything because we respect all our rivals but he just didn’t want to accept”. We offered Golovkin the money to fight twice.
“I don’t think he disgraced himself at all against a great fighter”, he said at the post-fight press conference.
Advertisement
“I need that fear factor in training otherwise I might get beat by someone I should never lose against, all because I couldn’t get up in the morning”. Canelo defended his promoter and defiantly said that De La Hoya offered Golovkin the fight and his team turned it down.
