Former undisputed lightweight champion Teofimo Lopez 18-1 (13) admitted he was disappointed with his ten-round split decision win over Sandor Martin 40-3 (13) at Madison Square Garden in New York City on Saturday night.
Spaniard Martin, 29, had his nose busted from an accidental head clash in the opening round but it didn’t appear to bother him too much throughout the 10-round bout.
In the second round Martin dropped Lopez with a right hand but the 25-year-old from Brooklyn wasn’t hurt.
For the rest of the fight Lopez looked to force the action while Martin boxed off the back foot.
At the conclusion one judge had Martin up 95-94, while the other two judges had Lopez winning by scores of 97-92 and 96-93.
“It’s so hard to fight somebody like this when they’re running the whole time,” Lopez said after the bout. “Every time this guy committed, I countered and got him every time. He just ran the whole time. It’s okay though. We got a lot to work on. But first off I want to thank God for this, no matter what it was. I apologise to everybody tonight. This is not how we perform. But, listen, our dancer partner was running the whole time.
“Every time that this man wanted to commit, I was countering him and tagging him. That’s why he was running the whole time. I felt great overall. I knew he was tired. He didn’t want to commit. He was staying on his back foot and just running around the whole time. But it is what it is. This makes it look good. These guys are going to want to fight me now. More than ever. Now this is great. Now I can actually have a good fight.”
Martin, who is two fights removed from his upset win over three-weight world champion Mikey Garcia, was unhappy with the two judges who scored the bout for Lopez.
“It was a surprise with the judges,” Martin said. “I won this fight clearly. For one judge, I only won two rounds? Really? There were two knockdowns. The referee didn’t count one of the knockdowns. He missed all of his punches. That’s a masterclass of boxing. That’s a robbery. But that’s the sport of boxing.
“In the ring, I controlled all the action. The timing. The moments. In the ring, controlled everything with my will. Teofimo was overanxious. In the eighth round, his corner told him, ‘Hey, let’s do it. You could lose this fight.’
“It wasn’t just the broken nose. I only had three weeks of preparation. The broken nose was from an accidental headbutt. But I didn’t worry about this. But I knew that it would hurt every time he punched me there. But he didn’t punch me. Every time he punched me, I said ‘Ow.’ But he touched me three times? Four times, maximum? Really? You win with this?”
Lopez, who moved up to the junior welterweight division in August, wants the big names in the 140-pound weight class.
“We would love to fight Josh Taylor,” he said. “We would love to fight Regis Prograis. Or even a rematch with George Kambosos. My whole thing now is just staying focused and staying devoted.”
