Inquest begins into farcical end to title fight.
The credibility of Australian boxing lies in tatters after yesterday's controversial title fight between Danny Green and Paul Briggs for the IBO cruiserweight title.
The bout was over in just 29 seconds after Briggs was 'caught' on the side of the head by a glancing punch that sent him to the canvas and was unable to beat the count.
Green appeared incensed at the method of victory as were the crowd who showered the challenger in beer as he left the arena.
Polls on websites in Australian have reflect the opinion of the boxing world, fightnews.com reporting 89 percent of fans believed the result to be a fixed one. The fallout for the incident could be far greater with the IBO welterweight champ Lovemore Ndou claiming the sport is dying a slow death. He told AAP:
'That's just how the world is going to look at us now, boxing in Australia is dying slowly, if we keep on sanctioning fights like this, the sport is going to die.'
Vic Darchinyan echoed those sentiments of his fellow countryman, questioning the effect that the result will have on future pay-per-view events.
'I'm a pay-per-view fighter, if people aren't going to like our fights and they are disappointed they are not going to buy any more, so they are not going to be following boxing, they are not going to support it,' Darchinyan told AAP.
The knock-on effect from the result will no doubt play out over the next few months, although Briggs has already claimed that the result was in no way premeditated. Certain areas of the Australian public have called for their money back or for the boxers purses to be donated to charity.
