“You don’t go swimming without getting wet.”
Josh Warrington beat Carl Frampton after 12 gruelling, gripping rounds in Manchester on Saturday night.
The Leeds native out-foxed and out-pointed The Jackal to win on all three of the judges’ scorecards but the crowd stood to acclaim both men after one of THE fights of 2018.
Warrington and Frampton waded into each other from the first bell and both delivered a series of punishing body-shots during the 12-round war. There were a number of crunching blows to the head too.
The contest was as frantic as it was even until we reached the latter stages, with ‘The Leeds Warrior’ landing the telling blows down the closing straight. As Frank Warren tweeted, mid-fight, both men stood, traded and flung the kitchen sink.
The final scores read 116-113, 116-112 and 116-112, with Frampton as gracious in defeat as he was brave in battle.
As one could expect, Warrington’s face and head was in some state following the fight. In the early hours of Sunday morning, the IBF featherweight champion shared a video of some of the more prominent post-fight damage he sustained.
“There’s no way I’m sleeping for another few hours,” remarked Warrington
When you’ve just been in a fight of the year…@J_Warrington 👊#WarringonFrampton pic.twitter.com/qe82N4lwg0
— Frank Warren (@FrankWarren) December 23, 2018
There’s no pillow known to humankind that would be soft enough not to cushion those bruises and welts.
One can only presume Frampton looks in a similar state today.
