WBA (Super) and IBF light welterweight champion of the world Josh Taylor (18-0, 13 KOs) has just achieved undisputed status, courtesy of his unanimous decision win over WBC and WBO titleholder José Ramírez (26-1, 17 KOs), unifying all four belts.
The fight was announced back in early March and on Saturday night, headed for the Virgin Hotels Las Vegas in Paradise, Nevada. At the time of its official announcement, Taylor insisted that it was going to be the biggest fight of his career and the Scotsman fought like the same.
I’ve trained my whole life for this: Taylor delivers a remarkable performance to become four belt champion
Ramírez went on the early offensive in the first rounds and by the fifth round, the American was leading ahead in the scores with connecting jabs that were taking the toll on Taylor and even giving him a cut over his left eye.
However, the “Tartan Tornado” made a blistering turnaround in the opening seconds of the sixth round and dropped Ramírez to the canvas with a staggering left hook. Taylor followed up the same in the seventh round once again, as “JCR” went down this time courtesy of Taylor’s brutal uppercut. The back to back knockdowns got the latter ahead in scores.
Taylor was able to keep his pressure in the remaining rounds, while conserving energies while Ramírez made some attempts to come back into the fight after the back to back knockdowns. However, the work was already done and courtesy of all three judges scoring the fight 114-112 in favour of Taylor, the new undisputed champion at 140.
“I’ve trained my whole life for this moment. I’ve dedicated my whole life for this moment,” Taylor said after the fight, “I’ve dreamt of it so many times over. I’m so, so happy. I’ve over the moon, man. I’ve trained for this moment all my life. Mum, Dad, Finch, Danielle: I told you I would do it! I told you I would do it and we’ve done it!”
“I’ve got nothing but love for Ramírez,” the 30-year-old went on, “this week was no disrespect. It was all part of the mind games to get in his head, to make him more eager to jump in at me and make him more aggressive, to use his aggression against him.”
