[Thomas Hearns]

Bute defeats Barkley!

On an entertaining fight #31 Lucian Bute 31-1-0 (27) scored a convincing unanimous decision win against tough #25 Iran Barkley 26-6-0 (20).
The fighters traded the first two rounds of the fight, the first for Bute and the second for Barkley. From rounds three to six Bute managed to outbox Barkley fighing from the outside.
On the seventh round Barkley had his moment in the fight when he dropped Bute with a hard strong hook. After Bute got up Barkley connected a pair of hard rights but Bute refused to fall again. Barkley continued dominating on the seventh round and with a hard cross he shook Bute.
The Romanian regained the control of the fight on the ninth round winning it on a convincing way. On the final round Bute connected a great straight right and dropped Barkley for a seven count. Barkley got up but less than two minutes later Bute dropped him again this time with a great hook to the head. Brave Barkley got up again and survived until the end of the fight.
The scorecards were 98-88 97-89 and 99-91 for Bute. (Fightnews card: 96-90 for Bute).

On the co-feature fight #47 Denis Inkin 23-3-2 (19) and #65 Henry Wharton 23-2-0 (19) fought to a draw. The fighters alternated on the dominance round by round for all the fight.
Wharton won the first round convincingly but then Inkin controlled rounds two and three the last on a one-sided form. Wharton reacted winning rounds four and five but again Inkin was better on rounds six and seven but Wharton edged the eighth stanza to even the fight again.
Inkin was the clear dominator on the ninth round and the last stanza was fought on even terms. The scorecards were 96-94 for Inkin 96-94 for Wharton and 95-95. (Fightnews card: 96-95 for Inkin).