Chisora suffers Nordic robbery

Ringside Report by Brendan Galbraith, Hartwell Arena, Helsinki: On Saturday night in front of a sell-out 12,000 partisan crowd at the magnificent Hartwell Arena, Dereck ‘Del Boy’ Chisora produced a career-best performance to dominate local hero Robert Helenius, but somehow found himself on the wrong side of a split decision.

‘Robbery’ is an over used word in boxing and of course scoring a fight is subjective, but it is difficult to fathom how two of the judges found the points to score this fight by two rounds to Helenius.

Chisora and his team complained of a ‘robbery’ at the post-fight press conference and they were wholly justified in doing so. It was an excellent performance by underdog Chisora. Chisora progressively seized control of the fight, forcing Helenius to fight short and in doing so, neutralising the big Finn’s height and reach advantages. Chisora’s trainer Don Charles implored Chisora to zigzag in and launch his attack by getting underneath Helenius’ jab and Dean Powell could be heard instructing the Finchley man to jab to the body and throw the overhand right. This was good advice and was effectively applied by Chisora, who maintained a high pace throughout the fight, outworking, outscoring and consistently landing the cleaner ‘knuckle punches’ to the head and body.

Helenius seemed hesitant to throw his right hand and I noted this several times throughout the fight. An explanation of this was provided in the post-fight press conference, where it was revealed that Helenius had hurt his right hand early in the fight.

Round-by-Round Fight Notes: The first round, Chisora staying close, rolling his head and ducking under Helenius’ jab and landing good body shots, tight opening round. Even.

Second, Helenius countered well with left hook and shaded it.

Cagey start to the third but Chisora landed the cleaner shots to body and head.

Chisora bossed the fourth, roughing up Helenius and slamming home heavy right and left hooks. The referee is constantly breaking up the fight and warning Chisora for fouling, particularly ‘use of his head’. This seems unfair, as it is clearly unintentionally, and more a result of clash of styles. In the fourth, the referee again warns Chisora for ‘use of the head’ – this time Chisora loses his temper and can clearly be heard shouting back at the Italian referee “You are pissing me off now”.

Chisora takes the fifth, Helenius looks too cautious to throw his right hand, but still scored some counters, Chisora landed more. Increasingly, Chisora is forcing the pace and making Helenius fight short.

In one exchange in the sixth, Chisora had Helenius on the ropes and Helenius held onto both Chisora’s arms – Don Charles screams at the referee to warn Helenius for holding, but no action is forthcoming from the referee. Chisora takes the sixth.

The seventh was a close round with Helenius’ shading it. A pattern is evolving – when Helenius takes the initiative to land a shot, Chisora immediately jumps back on to the Finn to retaliate.

The eighth was close, although Helenius finished the round with a good double combination to the head; Chisora accumulated clean, scoring shots prior to that. Even round.

The ninth was a good round for Chisora who worked well behind his jab and dictated the fight. Helenius punch output is very low and he seems to be tiring. Dean Powell can be heard saying that Helenius “is like Timo Hoffman all over – a big lump with no change of gear”.

In the 10th and 11th Helenius looks very sluggish, there is no power in his shots and he looks very tired. Helenius’ trainer, Ulli Wegner, is frantically gesturing with his hands – encouraging his charge to apply pressure on Chisora, but there is no response. Chisora still looks fresh and is completely outworking and outscoring the ‘Nordic Nightmare’ taking both rounds.

In the final round, Helenius trainer - bizarrely, can barely watch the fight – he has held his shirt up to his face - just below the eye line (pictured) and looks on with a strained demeanour. The crowd, at last have found their voice again, and are roaring their hero on. Helenius, finally becomes the aggressor and in an entertaining finale both men trade big shots in the centre of the ring. Helenius has his best round of the fight.

The bell sounds, it is in the hands of the judges now. Both fighters embrace. Don Charles is delighted with his fighter’s performance. The judges' scorecards are announced: 115-113 Helenius, 115-113 Chisora and 115-13 Helenius.

There is bewilderment at ringside. A Finnish reporter, who had been interviewed earlier by EPIX for their live telecast, told me in the post-fight press conference that he had scored the fight to Chisora by two rounds and that “was being generous” as he had scored two of the close rounds to Helenius.

It is baffling that two judges concluded that Helenius was the winner by two rounds. And, this is further complicated when, commentators wheel out the usual clichés of ‘the effect of the noisy partisan crowd’ could have a bearing on the judges scoring. Before a punch has been thrown in a fight, this intangible and unaccountable ‘atmospheric’ ingredient is engrained in the psyche of the commentator.

After viewing a repeat of the BoxNation production, the same clichés were predictably offered by the commentators. John Rawling remarked several times from a studio, presumably somewhere in London, that the crowd were cheering loudly when Helenius landed a shot and that this can influence the judges. The odd thing is that on this occasion, it is an exaggeration to say that the crowd cheered loudly when Helenius landed a shot, because they were so subdued for most of the fight – silenced by Chisora’s dominance of the fight.

Rawling’s co-commentator, Duke McKenzie also chipped in to say that ‘judges will not like Chisora’s showboating’! The judges are paid to do a professional job to score a fight according to the rules of boxing. According to the rules, showboating does not score or deduct points.

The decibels of noise from home fans, in support of their fighter does not translate onto the scorecards of a judge, according to the rules of boxing. The ready-made excuses for a judge's apparent incompetence, and I mean this in general – not only in this fight - serves no helpful purpose whatsoever.

I scored the fight by four rounds to Chisora and the two rounds that I scored even (1 and 8) were, if anything, probably a little generous to Helenius.

Chisora got robbed.