Katie Taylor vs. Karina Kopinska – Results

By Scott Gilfoid: Making her debut as a pro, 2012 Olympic Irish gold medalist Katie Taylor (1-0, 1 KOs) obliterated a badly over-matched journeyman Karina Kopinska (7-15-3, 2 KOs) by a 3rd round knockout on Saturday night at the Wembley Arena in London, UK.

Taylor, 30, caught the Polish fighter Kopinska against the ropes and flurries on her until referee Robert Williams stepped in and halted the massacre. The official time of the stoppage was at 0:58 of the 3rd.

Taylor was just teeing off from the 1st round in nailing Kopinska with hurtful looking combinations to the head and body. Taylor didn’t seem to need to worry about using any kind of finesse, because Kopinska wasn’t talented enough to throw anything back at her. It was just Taylor throwing and Kopinska catching shots to the head and body.

Taylor said to skysports.com this about her win over Kopinska after the match:

“It’s an absolute privilege to be here. This is obviously a huge night for women’s boxing. This is my pro debut. I don’t want to get too carried away. This is only the start and I hope to be a multi-weight champion.”

Well, it should be interesting to see how Taylor does against the better fighters in the sport in the lightweight division. Some of these women are going to punch back, and they’re going to punch back hard. As bad as Taylor’s opponent Kopinska was tonight, I don’t think you can learn much from here win tonight.

Taylor only had to go three rounds tonight and when she was in the amateurs. What happens when Taylor is dragged into the deep end of the pool by fighting in the late rounds against fighters that can punch back? It might be a different story for Taylor, because she’s going to be getting hit hard in fights that are going to test her stamina.

It’s much different story fighting 10 round fights than the three round matches that Taylor was accustomed to in fighting in the amateur ranks. I wouldn’t be surprised if Taylor is beaten again and again before she even gets to the top title fighters. It doesn’t matter that Taylor won honors in short fights of three rounds. She’s now going to be fighting longer fights against women that can really punch. I wouldn’t be surprised if Taylor gets beaten again and again. I’m just saying.

Taylor will be fighting next month on December 10 against an opponent still to be determined in a six round affair on the undercard of the Anthony Joshua vs. Eric Molina card at the Manchester Arena in Manchester, England. It’s unclear if Taylor’s fight will make it on the televised port of the Sky Box Office pay-per-view card. I doubt that Taylor’s fight will be televised, because there’s only so many fights that can be televised and the card has already got the following undercard fights:

Dillian Whyte vs. Dereck Chisora, Luis Ortiz vs. Dave Allen, Scott Quigg vs. Jose Cayetano, Luis Conception vs. Khalid Yafai, Hosea Burton vs. Frank Buglioni, and Callum Smith vs. Luke Blackledge. With all those fights on the card, it’s highly questionable whether Taylor’s fight against TBA will be televised. It’s not as if Taylor will be matched against a high caliber fighter at this point in her career. It’s likely going to be a fodder opponent to help her build up her stamina slowly.

Undefeated light welterweight Ohara Davies (14-0 11 Kos) defeated World Boxing Council Silver 140lb champion Andrea Scarpa (20-3, 10 Kos) by a 12 round unanimous decision. The final judges’ scores were 120-108, 120-108 and 120-108.

Davies had an easy time in plodding after Scarpa and nailing him with everything he threw. Scarpa didn’t have the punching power to keep the 24-year-old Davies off of him. It was pure brawling in the opening round of the fight with both guys nailing each other with shots.
Davies continued to get the better of Scarpa in rounds two through eight. It was too easy. Scarpa didn’t have the punching power to keep Davies off of him, and he was getting hit by too many shots. These were looping shots that a fighter with any kind of boxing skills would easily elude, but Scarpa didn’t have the talent to get out of the way of the punches, which was kind of sad.

Unbeaten British super featherweight champion Martin Ward (16-0-2, 8 KOs) retained his title with a close 12 round unanimous decision win over Ronnie Clark (17-4-2, 10 KOs). Ward was dropped in the 10th round. However, he held on to win the fight by the scores 116-112, 114-113 and 115-113. It was a lot of luck for the 25-year-old Ward to hold onto his title. It could have gone the other way.

American journeyman Carson Jones (40-11-3, 30 Kos) defeated previously unbeaten Ben Hall (9-1-1, 2 KOs) by a 6th round knockout to capture the vacant WBC International junior middleweight title. Hall’s corner threw in the towel in the 6th. The fight was halted by referee Ian John Lewis at 1:13 of the 6th. Hall made the mistake of trying to slug with the hard hitting Jones from the start of the fight. The two of them were trading bombs as early as the 2nd round. Hall looked fair during the early rounds, but Jones’ punching power started to wear him down by the 4th. Hall started to take punishment in that round from the hard right hands from Jones.

Hall said this to skyports.com after the fight about his loss to Jones:
“I must have broke it,” said Hall. I’m pretty sure, I’m absolutely heartbroken. I hope I didn’t let anyone down.”