By Charles Brun: Josh Kelly (13-1-1, 7 KOs) used his fast feet to defeat top ten 154-lb contender Troy Williamson (19-1-1, 14 KOs) by a 12 round unanimous decision on Friday night at the Newcastle Arena in Newcastle, England.
The former Eddie Hearn promoted Kelly, 28, picked up his third consecutive victory since moving up to junior middleweight earlier this year. The scores were 119-111, 118-110, and 119-109.
There was a fair amount of roughhousing in the fight, perhaps due to all holding & the showboating that Kelly was doing.
#6 WBO, #8 IBF Williamson didn’t like the constant tying up that Kelly was doing, which made it next to impossible for him to land shots. Kelly was on his bike the entire fight, forcing the slow-footed Williamson to follow him around.
When Williamson would catch up to the 2016 Olympian, he would get nailed by a single shot and then immediately grabbed in a clinch to prevent him from throwing anything. It was very frustrating to watch because Kelly refused to stand his ground, and he wasn’t about to allow Williamson to get a chance to land his heavy shots.
You can argue that Kelly has learned his lesson from his sixth round knockout loss to David Avanesyan last year in February that he doesn’t possess the power, chin, or toughness to stand and trade with his opponents without getting chopped down.
As such, #11 WBO Kelly has transformed him into a pure spoiler, who moves, potshots, showboats, and frequently holds. Kelly looked like a poor man’s Israil Madrimov tonight, and nowhere good enough to mix it with undisputed 154-lb champion Jermell Charlo or former WBO champ Brian Castano.
For Kelly to progress to the next level at 154, he will need to improve his jab, work his power and learn to stand and fight because he’s not going to beat the better fighters in the weight class with the style he has right now.
If Kelly opts to stay at the domestic level, he can carve out an existence fighting against those guys, but his garbage fighting style won’t work against the top guys in the division.
Had this been Sebastian Fundora, Tim Tszyu, Tony Harrison, Erickson Lubin, or Charles Conwell that he was in with tonight, Kelly would have been knocked out.
In the co-feature bout, light heavyweight contender Lyndon Arthur (21-1, 14 KOs) defeated Joel McIntyre (20-5, 5 KOs) by a second round knockout.
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