Martin Bakole, who just might be the dark horse of the heavyweight division, scored the biggest win of his pro career last night as he basically beat up, dominated, twice dropped and comprehensively defeated Tony Yoka right there in the hostile territory of Paris, France. The 28 year old, born in Kananga but having been based in Scotland for some time, dropped Yoka in rounds one and five (although the fifth round knockdown was almost certainly a slip) and he broke the Frenchman’s nose and also had him bleeding.
In the end, after ten largely one-sided rounds, Bakole was “awarded” a majority decision win, the scores being 96-92, 95-93 and a simply ludicrous, it-has-to-be-investigated 94-94. Bakole is now 18-1(13). Former Olympic gold medal winner Yoka falls to 11-1(9).
Last night’s fight was supposed to have taken place past year yet Covid got in the way. Yoka entered last night’s fight vowing to punish Bakole yet it proved to be the other way around. Bakole was far too physically strong for the taller Yoka, who was unable to keep Bakole off him. Yoka’s fine jab was never really a factor in the fight, which was a surprise in itself. Bakole had time to showboat and to taunt Yoka in the later rounds, knowing as he did that he had the fight won.
Although he almost didn’t! We’ve seen some bad cards just lately but last night’s drawn card has to be looked at as one of the worst in modern day boxing history. Yes, that bad. And the judge who only had Bakole winning the fight by two rounds wasn’t much better. It seems clear the French judges (all three of the officials being French) tried their best to rob Bakole. How else can we explain such awful scoring?
Yoka won, maybe two rounds, this at best. The right man won last night therefore it’s likely nothing will be done about those two disgusting score-cards. But something should be done, that’s for sure. But what?
Bakole is now rightfully basking in the glory of a big win, yet it was so nearly taken away from him. If one more round had been awarded to Yoka by the judge who had it 95-93, Yoka would today have a draw on his record, not a loss. Again, utterly unacceptable!
