Josh Warrington knocked out by Mauricio Lara in shocking first career defeat

Josh Warrington was brutally stopped by Mauricio Lara in the ninth round
Dave Thompson Matchroom Boxing
George Flood14 February 2021

Josh Warrington suffered a stunning first career defeat at the hands of the relatively unknown Mauricio Lara on a shocking night at The SSE Arena, Wembley.

Returning to the ring for the first time after a 16-month absence, ‘The Leeds Warrior’ - the overwhelming favourite heading into Saturday night’s bout - never looked right after a sluggish start and was dropped in a brutal fourth round but somehow made it to the bell as his hard-hitting Mexican opponent doled out some heavy punishment.

It looked briefly as if Lara, 22, may have let Warrington off the hook, but his barrage of big shots continued and the fight was eventually waved off in the ninth round after the former IBF featherweight world champion was caught with another massive left hand and left stricken on the canvas.

The result will go down as one of the biggest shocks in the recent history of British boxing, but Warrington’s decision to vacate the IBF belt last month due to the governing body’s refusal to sanction a unification showdown with WBA champion Xu Can means that Lara does not go home with championship gold despite an incredible, life-changing result.

Warrington was taken to hospital for assessment after a punishing loss, with many pundits and former fighters in agreement that the contest should have been called off by referee Howard Foster in the fourth, with the 30-year-old never recovering from that initial blitz.

Defeat leaves Warrington’s hopes for big title showdowns with the likes of Gary Russell Jr, Can and Emanuel Navarrete in tatters, with Matchroom chief Eddie Hearn eager for a rematch.

In the chief support act of the night, Zelfa Barrett came through a tough test against battle-hardened former world champion - and another one-time Warrington opponent - Kiko Martinez, though two 118-111 scorecards in the IBF Intercontinental super-featherweight titlist’s favour were branded as “absolutely disgusting” by Hearn after a close contest.

Leigh Wood stopped Warrington’s stablemate Reece Mould to claim the vacant British featherweight strap, while talented prospect Dalton Smith continued his impressive form with a dominant victory in a mismatch against Ishmael Ellis.

2018 Olympic Youth champion Hopey Price also eased past late replacement opponent Daniel Mendoza and Ricky Hatton charge Ibrahim Nadim beat Jonny Phillips in the night’s opening, non-televised bout.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in