It wasn’t an exciting action fight by any means, but in the end Maurice Hooker had put in the work to pull off a minor upset over Terry Flanagan to take home the WBO junior welterweight title.
The first half of the opening title fight was mostly all Maurice Hooker (24-0-3, 16 KOs). His basic jab, right hand pattern really exposed the worst of Terry Flanagan’s (33-1, 13 KOs) straight line tendencies. It wasn’t a rout by any means, but Hooker was somewhat surprisingly taking most rounds by some comfort. He simply just walked the local fighter into right hands time and time again. They weren’t heavy shots, but they were what was scoring. I had him up four rounds to two at the halfway point.
Terry Flanagan finally came to life in the seventh round. Counter intuitively it was his own blood that seemed to do it. Two big headbutts opened serious cuts on his forehead and over his right eye, but it only brought out the fury and intensity of the would be two division titleholder. He landed several nice right hands as Maurice Hooker suddenly seemed on the verge of collapse. On the replay I did wonder a bit whether or not the ferocious accidental headbutt that cut Flanagan’s forehead didn’t actually hurt Hooker a bit though.
Hooker rebounded nicely in the eighth and especially in the ninth. That frame looked like the first half of the fight again as he circled and walked Flanagan into right hands. The tenth was the same as the Manchester native followed him around the ring to be picked off one shot at a time. There was some thought that Terry Flanagan’s championship rounds experience would translate to success in the eleventh and twelfth, but that was only partially true. He seemed dead exhausted in the eleventh until a strong flurry at the end. He then came out in the final frame with a big attack, but Hooker responded even with even more strength and won the round from there on out.
In the end I only found three rounds to give to Terry Flanagan in this fight and scored it 117-111 to Maurice Hooker. I fully expected closer cards given all the narrow rounds and British locale. They delivered as the cards were read back 115-113 Hooker, 117-111 Flanagan, and 117-111 Maurice Hooker in that order. In a touching moment, Maurice Hooker absolutely collapsed face first to the canvas with joy when the last card came in for him and he realized that he was now a world titleholder. The less said about the 117-111 Terry Flanagan card, the better.
