Joe Calzaghe wins over Bernard Hopkins via split-decision in their much anticipated fight tonight at Thomas and Mack Center at Las Vegas.

Judge Adalaide Byrd scored the bout 114-113 in favor of Bernard Hopkins but Chuck Giampa (116-111) and Ted Gimza (115-112) both scored in favor of Calzaghe who showed excellent boxing in the second half of the fight.

Joe Calzaghe had to recover from a first round knock-down when he ate a right from Bernard Hopkins, of which he would say later : “As the fight wore on, I had to really let my punches go. He was very defensive. A win is a win. I was only hurt once and he never caught me with a cleanpunch.” Calzaghe mastered the distance as he jabbed away at Bernard Hopkins, who at times didn’t seem to get hurt even when he was absorbing Joe’s heavy punches from both hands.

Here’s Round 1-2 of the fight from Youtube.

Round 3-4

Round 5-6

Round 7-8

Round 9-10

Round 11-12

Following this announcement of the winner, Calzaghe is hailed as the top light heavyweight boxer of the world and gets the same award from Ring Magazine.



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