Saturday 8 June 2013

Yuriorkis Gamboa v Darleys Perez

The often entertaining Yuriorkis Gamboa (23-0, 16) may have claimed the WBA "interim" Lightweight title by out pointing the previously unbeaten Darley's Perez (28-1, 19) though he'll have made absolutely no new fans on this performance. In all honesty he may well have turned fans, promoters and television networks against him with this awfully tedious performance.

The bout started moderately well as a chess match with Gamboa dropping Perez at the end of the opening round after being caught with a solid counter or two himself. Sadly however the bout failed to take off as both men played a very cagey game of chess for 12 rounds with little of note landed by either man.

Gamboa, often seen as one of the sports most exciting fighters, failed to ever push the action like he seemed capable of and instead was happy to land single fast shots then move and move and move whilst throwing a number of shots from a distance that had no hope of landing. Perez, standing outside of range for the vast part of the fight repeatedly looked for single counters and almost refused to lead in fear of being caught by a counter himself.

With both men being negative there was little wonder that the crowd booed throughout and let their feelings be known. They had been let down and whilst Perez's limitations were obvious Gamboa could, and should, have provided so much more, despite this being his first fight at 135lbs.

With 2 less than impressive performances by Gamboa his already small fan base may well start turning their back on him with performances like this.

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