LOS ANGELES – Mexico’s Emanuel Navarrete survived a knockdown on the way to a ninth-round technical knockout of Australian Liam Wilson on Friday, to claim the vacant World Boxing Organisation super featherweight world title in controversial circumstances.
Wilson and his camp claimed that the favoured Mexican was given 27 seconds to recover from a left hook that sent him to the canvas in the fourth round.
Navarrete, 28, the WBO’s featherweight champ and a former super bantamweight world champion, claimed the title formerly held by Shakur Stevenson in a tense fight in Glendale, Arizona.
But Wilson, 26, gave the heavily favoured champ a scare, knocking down Navarrete in the fourth round and hurting him again in the sixth.
Speaking amid tears after missing out on a world title that he had promised his father Peter on his deathbed, Wilson told the Australian media: “I can see his face. And I felt it was a knockout.
“His eyes were stuffed. He was on the ground, eyes rolling in his head.
“It looked like he was definitely gone and it’s a shame it took a lot of time for him to get back up, to get his composure and senses back.
“Then, he was able to spit his mouth guard out. Buy a few more seconds. Next thing you know it’s nearly 30 seconds. I don’t think that’s fair. It’s not right.
“(The referee) took so long and there was enough time for him to find his measure again.”
The promoter registered a protest after the fight. It will be reviewed by the Arizona Boxing Commission at its next meeting on Feb 15.
Navarrete, who improved to 37-1 with 31 wins inside the distance, turned the tables in the seventh and eighth with quick flurries that put Wilson on the defensive.
Wilson, who fell to 11-2 with seven knockouts, rose from a knockdown in the ninth, but referee Chris Flores called a halt at 1:57 of the round with the Australian withering under Navarrete’s follow-up barrage.
Said Wilson: “I had control through the first four or five rounds and slipped up after that. Not only was I in a fight, I was in a fight with the officials and I knew myself the fight should have been over.
“My style changed after that, I was looking for that one punch, throwing the left hook over and over to try and finish the fight and that exerted too much energy.
“It’s very disappointing that I lost. I had so much on the line.” AFP
