John Ryder easily picks up the WBA interim super middleweight title.
Australian late replacement Bilal Akkawy (20-1-1, 16 KO’s) suffered a quick and bruising
knockout loss at the hands of John “The Gorilla” Ryder (28-4, 16 KO’s).
Ryder was able to score a third round TKO stoppage and snatch up the interim WBA super middleweight title in the process. The prizefight served as the opening bout for the Alvarez v Jacobs unification.
To begin, the match opened with a complete dud of a round.
Throughout the first half of the first round the two fighters literally just circled one another. After the sparse crowd began booing, the two men did begin to throw a few punches. Nothing serious, and nothing of note landed.
Ryder came to life in the second round. Now operating behind his jab, the Gorilla began touching Akkawy’s body while moving around the ring as he pleased. For this part, Akkawy appeared very dry, stiff and uncomfortable. Then in the third round Ryder landed a nasty right hook on Akkawy’s chin. The Australian went down in a heavy heap.
To his credit, the Australian did make it to his feet in plenty of time to beat the count. Then for the
next minute or so, Ryder pelted Akkawy around the ring with relative ease. Throughout the
onslaught, the Gorilla landed a large measure of his power shots. While caught in the corner,
Akkawy got dropped for a second time.
For the second straight time Akkawy found his feet, however his legs didn’t look good. Finally, once pinned against the ropes, Bilal Akkawy ate one last crunching uppercut. After this final uppercut jarringly snapped his head back referee Jay Nady jumped in and halted the action while Akkawy was still on his feet.
By: Bakari Simpson
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