WITH the performance of his life, Anthony Cacace won the fight of his life as he emphatically beat Joe Cordina to win the IBF world super-featherweight title in Saudi Arabia.
Cacace had the previously unbeaten Welshman down with a peach of an uppercut in the third round and although Cordina’s head cleared the ‘Andytown Apache’ dominated the contest until he ended it in the eighth.
Again and again southpaw Cacace nailed the Welshman with booming hooks and three vicious uppercuts in-a-row in the sixth. Thirty-nine seconds into the eighth round it was all over. The cold-blooded barrage that ended it started with a stinging right hook and Cacace continued with a two-handed assault to head and body which prompted the referee to step in.
“I’m in shock,” Cacace said.
“Joe is a hell of a competitor but I was hurting him with every single shot. The referee said break as I threw a punch (in the third round), there was nothing dirty about it.
“I was an IBO World champion, everybody discredits the IBO but this is a title as well so I was a world champion coming in here – at least according to my kids! Now I’m an IBF world champion.”
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Cacace settled a few scores with Matchroom Boxing, in particular, super-featherweight rival Zelfa Barrett and said “none of yiz are getting a chance” to fight for his title.
He won’t be short of offers now and a smiling Frank Warren paid a heartfelt tribute to the skills of the underdog from West Belfast.
“We will see what’s next, we will sit down as a team and make our decision, there’s no rush to do anything,” said Queensbury Boxing boss Warren.
“The name of the game is what he did tonight and what he did tonight was a fantastic performance. He was a big underdog according to everybody coming here tonight but he’s come out here and shown what he’s all about.
“My only concern was that he didn’t fight regularly enough but look what he had in the tank there. Brilliant shots, he read the fight well, he’s hard to hit and he did an absolute, professional, top quality job.”
In the main event, Oleksandr Usyk beat Tyson Fury by split decision to become undisputed world heavyweight champion. Uysk started well against a reactive Tyson but once the ‘Gypsy King’ began to force the pace the Ukrainian began to look second best.
However, he fought back brilliantly, dominating the ninth and sending Fury crashing to the canvas in the ninth. Two judges scored in his favour - 115-113 and 114-113 with the other giving it Fury at 114-113.
