There’s an obvious level of hyperbole in calling any fight card “The Card of the Century” as Turki Alalshikh did with Saturday’s event headlined by the rematch between undisputed light heavyweight champion Artur Beterbiev and Dmitry Bivol (follow here). For a card to hold up to that label, the action in the ring has to be as good as advertised. Callum Smith and Joshua Buatsi held up their end of the bargain in going to war over 12 rounds before Smith took the win by unanimous decision.
Both men were content to stand and trade big shots from the opening bell, but it was Smith who did the better work for most of the first half of the fight. Smith focused much of that early attack on Buatsi’s body, looking to wear down the Ghanaian brawler.
A left hook to the body had Buatsi badly hurt in Round 5 and a right hand to the body moments later had Buatsi compromised and feeling the pain in both sides of his body.
Things got worse for Buatsi in Round 6 as Smith kept the pressure on and used his body work to open up Buatsi’s head. Buatsi was left reeling around the ring as Smith unloaded his arsenal. Despite the all-out attack, Buatsi never hit the canvas and even closed the round with a massive hook that seemed to hurt Smith.
Smith appeared to have exhausted much of his gas tank in his assault in the sixth round and Buatsi was able to up his attack, putting Smith in danger several times over the second half of the fight with his own attacks to the body and head.
At the conclusion of 12 rounds, it appeared the scorecards could justifiably go either way but it was Smith who took all three official cards by scores of 115-113, 116-112 and an absurd 119-110.
With the victory, Smith finds himself in the mix at the top of the light heavyweight division alongside names like Beterbiev, Bivol and David Benavidez.
