Lewis Ritson is undefeated no longer.
The first round was fought at the crisp pace we’ve come to expect from a Lewis Ritson (17-1, 11 KOs) fights. The Englishman charged forward with his typical tenacity and he worked behind a nice jab, but Francesco Patera (20-2-1, 7 KOs) also worked quite well off the back foot. It was exciting stuff right out of the gate. The second round was similar, as was the third. I really liked the way the rising British star was working the body in round three and at that point I had scored all the rounds for him. While the fourth tonally was similar, Francesco Patera landed some nice shots upstairs and down. I gave him his first round.
That was only the start of Patera’s successes in the fight. Round five was extremely one sided in the European champion’s favor. He moved his hands at the highest volume I’ve ever seen him throw them at and had great success in doing so. Everything was landed on the local favorite. The sixth wasn’t quite as dominant, but it was still in the Belgian’s favor behind his flashier work on the outside. I had the fight even at its halfway mark.
Round seven didn’t slow the house fighter’s freefall in the fight. While the Newcastle man did some good work in the middle of the round, he finished the round dazed against the ropes. Patera isn’t a puncher traditionally, but he clearly had something going when the bell rang to save Ritson. He came out to try to reclaim it immediately, but a tired looking Lewis Ritson did manage to restabilize a bit to get his first round for a while on my card. I liked his body work a lot. He kept it going in the ninth too by working Patera against the ropes.
Francesco Patera came back out in force in round ten though. He bobbled Ritson’s head around the ring at time without falling into the ropes like he had in the previous two rounds. He really lit Lewis up at the end of the round as well. It briefly looked like a stoppage might be coming and Francesco came back out in the eleventh looking for it. The Newcastle fighter showed tremendous heart to fight back and even have the advantage in the final thirty seconds or so of the round, but he got beat up for most of the eleventh too. I again thought he might be about to be stopped at several moments. He never was though. While Patera clearly again won the twelfth and at times was landing almost with comical ease, I was just as captivated by the bravery of Lewis Ritson in there. He was getting beaten up and he just kept coming forward throwing anyway.
This was a great fight. It was two men slugging it out in there with basically no lulls in the action. I scored the fight 115-113 for Francesco Patera. Given that he was on the road in the UK against a local rising star with some money behind him though, I did have some concern about the cards. They came back split too. All three were 116-112 and thankfully two of them came back for the right man. Francesco Patera picked a career best win. Lewis Ritson will have lost his rise towards a world title here, but I’ll be happy to watch him any day anyway.
