Home Fight Results History made: Ricky Burns stops Di Rocco in eight

History made: Ricky Burns stops Di Rocco in eight

At The SSE Hydro, Glasgow, Scotland, on Saturday night, Coatbridge’s Ricky Burns,33, joined fellow Brits Bob Fitzsimmons and Duke McKenzie as a three-weight World champion and the first man from Scotland to achieve this historical boxing feat. The Scot had previously held World titles in the super featherweight and lightweight divisions.
The last few years haven’t been easy with defeats to quality operators like Terrence Crawford, Dejan Zlaticanin and Omar Figueroa Jr. He entered this fight off the back of two wins.
The previous champion Adrien Broner was stripped when failing to make weight for a defence against Britain’s Ashley Theophane.

Michele Di Rocco,34, was the man standing in the way of ‘Rickster’ for the vacant WBA World super lightweight title. He was a former European champion with only one defeat on his record, which was back in 2007 and he later avenged.
Burns is more comfortable at lightweight but trainer Tony Sims got him in tremendous shape for this fight.

An aggressive start by the man from Umbria, Italy but it was him that was shaken early by a counter left. In the following rounds, Burns boxed in a controlled manner, with neat left jabs and sharp combinations. Always a step ahead of the Italian. Burns did get in some good body shots though a left strayed well low of the border in the third. Di Rocco was at times left hook happy but often out of range and never had a defensive answer for Ricky’s straight right hands. It was a solid right against the ropes that dropped the Italian, who beat the count and was fortunate that the bell signalled the end of the round.
Burns moved well, was pinpoint with his punches against a plucky fighter, who was trying but just outclassed. The Italian gave it a go in the 6th and 7th but was unable to pin his superior opponent down.
The end came in the eighth, a hurt Di Rocco looking to move while being hunted down by Burns, a barrage in the corner dropped Michele and while he made it to his feet, he had nothing left and referee Terry O’Connor rightly waved it off.

Many had thought Burns was coming to the end, myself included, but he looked very sharp and in creating history can help inspire more Scottish young boxers. Burns is still in town and that is a huge boost for Scottish and British boxing. Burns put the win down to the tremendous hard work he’d done in the gym and on this display there is a lot more to come.

Ricky Burns record is now 40-5-1, 14 KOs while Michele Di Rocco drops to 40-2-1, 18 KOs.