Rocky Fielding: ‘I thought I could mix it with Canelo Alvarez. I shouldn’t have’

LIVERPOOL’S Rocky Fielding can only rue what might have been. He didn’t stay down when a left hook dropped him to a knee in the first round. He rose again in the second but he couldn’t make it through three rounds with the brilliant Canelo Alvarez.

“I never shied away from the challenge,” Rocky reflected afterwards. “I dared to be great. I lived the dream but I’ll come again. I’ll come back.”

Fielding appraised what Alvarez does well. “He’s strong. I was catching him with some shots but he kept coming forward. The body shots, it was more like the wind was getting took,” the Liverpudlian said.

Fielding gave his immediate reaction to his undoing. It was that “he [Canelo] placed his shots well and he caught me”.

“I stood there too long. I thought I could mix it with him and I shouldn’t have,” Rocky explained. “You’ve seen the height of me compared to him, I should have kept it long. But I just stood there with someone who’s elite and who’s strong and he caught me. I gave it everything and the better man won.”

Rocky concluded, “He does everything well. His timing’s good, his shot selections are good. His presence, just being there and making me work when I didn’t have to. I knew I shouldn’t switch off and I had to be on my game, I never kept it long. I just stood there. He’s an elite fighter, he’s a great fighter. It was his night.

“He got me.”