After 12 rounds of controlled fury, Juan Manuel Marquez dethroned WBC super featherweight champion Marco Antonio Barrera, at Las Vegas’ Mandalay Bay last night, in a battle of evenly matched 33-year-olds.
Oozing class and thrills, the battle between Mexico’s elite was one of the best in the past five years, and the pair punished one another with exquisitely chosen punches as they alternated the upper hand.
While Barrera was smooth and crafty, Marquez was the more intense and his punches carried greater impact. After a nervy start, Marquez troubled the champion with combinations, and had Barrera on the verge of a stoppage in the seventh.
Having been hammered with right hand after right hand, Barrera kept himself in the fight by dropping Marquez with a right cross of his own. But that wasn’t the end of the dramatic round – in a moment of madness, Barrera belted Marquez while down, causing referee Jay Nady to deduct a point from the champion.
That Nady didn’t acknowledge the knockdown punch hurt Barrera further on the cards of a close fight, what could have been a 10-8 round reversed thanks to bad luck and his own error. Marquez rebounded from the setback impressively, and was willing to take more chances over a magnificent final third that saw him claim the biggest scalp of his career.
Scores were surprisingly wide – 116-111 twice and a shocking 118-109 – but Marquez seemed to have done enough. Having failed to get the decisions against Freddie Norwood (L12), Manny Pacquiao (D12) and Chris John (L12), Juan Manuel raised his performance and seemed to ‘want it’ that little bit more.
Now he can stand as one of this generation’s very finest.
Thanks to the seventh round controversy, the strange scoring and the brilliance of the fight, there is every reason for a rematch, which has been penciled in for September 16. Marquez, to his immense credit, appeared eager to give Barrera a rematch, which is ironic given how long it took Barrera to give Marquez his shot at glory.
A partner in Golden Boy Promotions, Barrera (now 63-5, 42 inside) felt he’d been robbed.
Marquez, whose record jumps to 47-3-1 (35 KOs), gains the WBC super featherweight crown.
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The undercard saw more unusual scoring, with brilliant super flyweight Gerry Penalosa given little or no credit for his defense and clean punching, as he lost unanimously to WBO SUPER BANTAM titlist Daniel Ponce De Leon. While De Leon outworked the smaller man and deserved to win, it was odd to see the vaunted puncher get on his bike, and 119-109 (twice) and 120-108 appeared well out of order.
Steve Forbes also had something to complain about, after dropping a 12 rounder to Demetrius Hopkins, whose uncle Bernard is a partner in GBP, the show’s promoter. Tallies of 118-110 (twice) and 117-111 for Hopkins raised more than a few eyebrows.
