The 48-month long awaited closing of the trilogy between Mexico’s Saul “Canelo” Alvarez and Kazakhstan’s Gennady Golovkin was translated into 12 rounds that ended with a unanimous decision victory of 116-112 and a double 115-113 in favor of Canelo, a verdict received with resounding boos from a good part of the more than 20 thousand fans who paid for expensive tickets to fill the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, last Saturday.
The bout of the the two fighters, who are considered the took place far apart, fought in the same arena in September 2017 and in September 2018 and ended in a draw and a majority decision victory for Alvarez.
The WBA, WBC, IBF and WBO super middleweight belts held by the 32-year-old fighter from Guadalajara, Jalisco were at stake.
A dull victory
The fight was tedious with rounds lacking emotional action, in which Alvarez deployed a timid offensive, with sporadic attacks of long and ineffective right hands (at the end he declared to TV that his left had been injured since before the clash and that he must have surgery soon), he took a clear advantage in the first seven rounds against an opaque GGG without mobility, very far from the fighter we have seen in previous performances, in which he attacked and punched without respite. He gave us the impression that: 1) The 40 years of age seem to have already taken their toll on him and 2) Being a natural middleweight, the extra pounds slowed him down.
So much so during the fight he only showed fleeting glimpses of the erupting volcano of dozens of his previous 44 fights in which he put 37 opponents to sleep, with one previous loss to Saturday’s opponent and a draw in 44 appearances.
He half ” came back to life” in rounds 8-9-10 and 11, in which he discounted a portion of the wide margin that the opponent had taken, with one or another good impact and even put the enemy to the ropes, who was exhausted at that point of the challenge.
In those rounds from 8 to 11 GGG showed more spirit and desire to reverse the score against him, but he did not have enough time or power to do it. In our personal scorecard, taken in front of the TV, we agreed with judge Dave Moretti (116-112), with 8 rounds won by Alvarez and 4 lost.
