Sunday 15 June 2014 09:53, UK
Brian Rose fell short in his bid to take the WBO light-middleweight title from Demetrius Andrade, suffering a seventh-round stoppage defeat at the Barclays Center in New York.
Rose went into the bout off the back of 11 straight successes but was soon given an idea of the challenge at hand when he was knocked down in the opening round.
The Englishman was dropped by a straight left early on and although he successfully overcame the setback, Andrade had him down again in the third, this time courtesy of a counter right hook.
Once again the Blackpool boxer climbed off the canvas to continue, though the rounds were clearly not going his way as his American opponent built up a healthy advantage on the scorecards.
In the end, though, the judges were not required. By the seventh referee Michael Griffin decided he had seen enough, calling a halt to the fight to make sure a bloodied Rose didn’t have to take any further punishment.
Southpaw Andrade has now won all 21 wins as a professional, having entered the paid ranks after a highly-successful amateur career.
In the main event in the Big Apple, Chris Algieri recovered from being knocked down twice in the opening round to take the WBO light-welterweight belt from Ruslan Provodnikov.
The native New Yorker was hit by a crushing left hook in the first that saw swelling emerge around his right eye immediately. He was then forced to take a knee after another punch, suggesting champion Provodnikov would be in for a short night.
However he overcame the double setback, and the nasty injury, to get the better of the Russian as the rounds wore on, using precision punching to cope with his rival’s obvious power.
Algieri was given the nod 114-112 by two of the judges at ringside to become world champion, with the other making it 117-109 to Provodnikov.
"The shots I was getting hit with the first four rounds, they were few and far between," said Algieri afterwards. "They were big, but they were lunging shots - he caught me on the end of the shots. Really the only shot that hurt me was that first shot."
