Foster Navarrete fight result
O'Shaquie Foster unified the WBC, WBO and IBF super-featherweight world titles with a unanimous decision over Emanuel Navarrete at Frost Bank Center in San Antonio, Texas. Two judges scored the fight 118-108. The third returned 115-111.
Foster, 33, is a native of Orange, Texas, and fought in his home state. He closed the bout with two knockdowns in the twelfth round. Navarrete beat the count both times and was still standing at the final bell.
The wide cards measured how little the Mexican was able to land cleanly. Navarrete threw, chased and crowded, but the scoring blows belonged almost entirely to the man in front of him.
Navarrete's pressure meets Foster's counters
Navarrete fought the way he always fights. He walked forward, threw in volume, and tried to drag Foster into exchanges at short range. Foster refused the invitation. He moved his feet, made Navarrete miss, and answered with counters from angles the Mexican could not close.
For long stretches the bout was a sound rather than a spectacle: gloves thudding into forearms and shoulders, canvas creaking under a pivoting heel, the crowd's gasp arriving a beat after the punch. Navarrete was relentless. He was rarely clean.
The pattern held because Foster's legs kept him off the ropes and his counters kept Navarrete honest. When Navarrete loaded up, he hit air or arms. When he paused to reset his feet, Foster scored.
As the rounds passed, Foster's confidence changed the shape of the fight. He stopped retreating and began to plant his feet and trade, and the cleaner work was his. By the championship rounds his corner was asking him to end the show.
Foster's finish and the one belt left
He nearly did. Foster put Navarrete down twice in the twelfth, the second knockdown coming with the result already settled on the cards. Navarrete survived to the bell, but the round removed any doubt about the decision.
"It was a great performance. I finished strong, and I put him down twice in the end," Foster said. "A lot of people were saying that I didn't have power and that I wouldn't be able to keep him off me. But I showed that I am a complete fighter."
Foster now holds three versions of the 130-pound title. He wants the fourth, and he framed it as the last item on a short list. "I want to become undisputed. That's my dream. I want to make history, and all I need is one more [title]." He did not name an opponent or a date.
That is the next question the division has to answer. Foster has the belts, the home-state win and the leverage; the remaining champion has the only thing Foster still wants.
Navarrete accepts the style problem
Navarrete, the Mexican star, did not dispute the outcome. "In this sport, it's about styles. And his style was better than mine today. Congrats to him," he said. "I knew he was an exceptional and complete fighter. I knew what we were facing."
He added: "Perhaps I could have pushed more, but I'm content with my performance."
The defeat leaves Navarrete with the problem he carried into the ring: pressure and volume against a fighter who can make him miss, and no clean route to the target once his feet stop moving. Foster leaves with three belts and a negotiation to win.
The original report is from skysports.com.