Saul Alvarez W12 William Scull... In Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, world super middleweight champion Saul "Canelo" Alvarez regained the IBF title from the defensive-minded William Scull, a German-based Cuban. The fight was not exciting, and early Punchstat numbers indicated the 445 combined punches thrown was the lowest recorded total for a twelve-round fight in Compubox's forty-year history. If Alvarez-Scull is remembered at all, it will only be because it set up a huge fight between Alvarez and multi-division champion Terence Crawford later this year. Scull enjoyed a height and reach advantage over Alvarez but fought mostly in retreat. The enduring image of Scull from this fight will be him moving away from Alvarez with his hands over his head. Oddly, Scull's smiles and body language for musch of the fight indicated he thought he was beating Alvarez, but few would agree with that assessment. Certainly, the judges didn't agree with Scull, scoring the fight for Alvarez by counts of 115-113, 116-112 and 119-109. Scull (23-1) did not win himself any fans with his performance. Even Alvarez seemed frustrated with Scull's negative performance. "For me it was a boring fight," admitted Alvarez. "He was just trying to survive."

 

Alvarez (63-2-2) seems like his legendary skills are beginning to fade. He had an extremely low punch output, perhpas historically low, and he was ineffective in cutting off the ring. He also has not scored a knockout since 2021, when he got to Caleb Plant in the eleventh round. After the fight, de facto promoter Turki Alalshikh had Alvarez and Crawford face off in the ring and announced they will face each other on September 13th in Las Vegas' Allegiant Stadium. 

 

Scull was one of the most lightly regarded champions in boxing, having acquired a vacant IBF title that was stripped from Alvarez because he was faced with multiple mandatory defenses. Scull did not impress even in winning the vacant title last October, because he gained the belt via a controversial decision over Vladimir Shishkin. The belt was the only reason Alvarez had any interest in fighting Scull.