Saturday night, during the debut of his Showtime Super Six Tourney, 41 year old Glen “The Road Warrior” Johnson, 51-14-2 (35), proved that age really is just a number by stopping his opponent, 31 year old Alan Green, 29-3 (20), in the eighth round. The win ensures a spot in the tournaments semi-finals, which also includes fighters Andre Ward (22-0, 13 KO’s), Arthur Abraham (31-1, 25 KO’s) and Carl Froch (26-1, 20 KO’s), with the pairing to be set after Abraham and Froch meet up to fight for the vacant WBC super middleweight title on November 27th.
Johnson, whose aggressive style was present throughout the fight, seemed to stun Green in round two and kept up the pressure until landing a combination and putting Green down for the count at the 22 second mark of the 8th round. Green, clearly hurt, immediately started to complain about a possible rabbit punch causing him to be floored and then struggled to make it to his feet before referee Robert Byrd waved off the fight. Green continued to protest the stoppage as Johnson came over and hugged his opponent. Most surprising about the stoppage was that the eighth round had started out as a very good round for Green. He started out as the aggressor and was catching Johnson with some good shots. Johnson, the more experienced fighter, just kept coming forward and seemed to capitalize on Green dropping his left and bending over, the left side exposed. Johnson landed a bomb and it seemed to be over for the night. An appeal on the loss has been filed by Green’s camp, stating that Green was knocked down by illegal rabbit punches to the back of the head by Johnson. The appeal has been filed, but no decision has been made during the writing of this article.
The fight itself was a very competitive one with one judge having Johnson up 68-65 while the other two had Green up 67-66. This writer had the bout scored 68-65 in favor of Johnson and it seemed that the more elder Johnson was actually getting stronger, while Green was starting to fade and start to forget to defend himself. I spoke with Johnson on Sunday night and he felt that the win came from sticking to his game plan laid out by his corner.
What was found out after the bout was the friendship that the two opponents shared. The two met during sparring sessions when Johnson was preparing to fight Roy Jones Jr., a fight in which he KO’d Jones Jr. in the 9th round. Green and Johnson have been friends ever since.
Both Johnson and Green were replacement fighters in the tournament. Green stepped into the tournament after Jermaine Taylor dropped out due to injury. In his first Super Six fight, dropping an unanimous decision to tourney favorite Andre Ward. Glen Johnson replaced Mikkel Kessler who suffered an eye injury in his Super Six win against Carl Froch. The Super Six standings are now:
Fighter Fights Pts.
1. Andre Ward 2 6
2. Arthur Abraham 2 3
3. Glen Johnson 1 3
4. Carl Froch 2 2
5. Alan Green 2 0 (Eliminated)
Bob Carroll
www.convictedartist.com
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