Calzaghe Dethornes Hopkins

By Arvin Nundloll

Joe Calzaghe brought the Ring Magazine Light Heavyweight belt back to Wales by defeating Bernard Hopkins in a split decision at the Thomas and Mack Center, Las Vegas.

From the opening bell, Calzaghe attacked Hopkins viciously and paid the price when a counter right floored Calzaghe, which sent shivers down the spines of the 8,000 traveling welshmen.

Calzaghe struggled to find his way through the opening rounds of the fight, allowing Hopkins to dictate the pace of the fight and pick off Calzaghe with crisp counter punching. From the third round onwards Calzaghe gained more confidence and made the ring his own.

Calzaghe bullied and frustrated Hopkins, who was now struggling to find his jab and reach with an eager Calzaghe at his every step. This in turn led Hopkins to deploy his old school style of fighting, hitting Calzaghe low and coming in with is head in an attempt to frustrate Calzaghe.

When this failed to work, Hopkins over emphasized an apparent low blow form Calzaghe, in which he took 3 minutes to recover from. This was an indication that Hopkins had become unsettled and knew Calzaghe was not going to give up in his constant barrage of punches.

When the bell sounded after the 12th round, Calzaghe instinctively knew he had won, while a aged Hopkins was reflecting on what could have been.

The judges scorecards read 114-113 Hopkins and 115-112, 116-111 all in favor to Joe Calzaghe. I had it scored a draw at 114-114 but would not begrudge Calzaghe, who showed his class and gave an excellent boxing display in such difficult circumstances

Another point to note was the poor performance of referee Joe Cortez. Not only did he fail to warn Hopkins for his repeated holding and head clashes, but let Hopkins fight dirty in clear sight of everyone in attendance, had Hopkins won, the blame would have layed on Cortez's failure to control his own fight. This had happened previously in the Hatton - Mayweather fight where Cortez was the complete opposite, breaking up Hatton from fighting up close and penalizing Hatton for fighting.

Joe Calzaghe commented that it was too eager and fell into the hands of the master tactician “I knew Bernard Hopkins was a good counter puncher and I knew he had a good right hand and I fell straight into the trap,I didn’t see the punch”.

Hopkins however, was more disappointed than angry at the judges scoring “I got beaten tonight, but it wasn’t by Joe Calzaghe”.

Freddie Roach commented on the knock down from Hopkins

“He caught him with a good shot,” Hopkins’ trainer Freddie Roach said. “It was a flash knockdown, and I don’t think he was hurt really badly, but Bernard should have jumped on him.”

Calzaghe ended up having the last laugh before bathing in his success as arguably one of Britain's best ever fighters “He didn’t say much, because he’d just gotten his ass kicked by a white guy.”

Calzaghe is now due to fight Roy Jones Junior, who was present at ringside to cheer on Calzaghe and even supplied tips to his corner. This would be a huge fight should it be at Wales, where a crowd of over 50,000 could be present and cap off an excellent way to end both Calzaghe and Jones Jnr's careers. For now Calzaghe will long remember his only fight in Las Vegas and one in which he feels he did not perform to his full ability and will look to give his following fans one more big fight before he leaves us for Boxing's Hall of Fame.

PunchStat Report Courtesy of CompuBox

Bernard Hopkins vs Joe Calzaghe
04/19/2008    LAS VEGAS
Winner by Split Dec: Calzaghe

Total Punches Landed / Thrown

Jabs Landed / Thrown

Power Punches Landed / Thrown

Final PunchStat Report

                                                                       Punches  Landed / Thrown