Impressive win for ‘underdog’ Warrington

YORKSHIRE boxer Josh Warrington is content to remain an underdog but hopes there can be no doubting his status as one of the world’s best featherweights after a barnstorming victory over Carl Frampton.

The two combatants engaged in a contender for fight of the year at Manchester Arena but Warrington came out on top of the numerous bruising exchanges to earn a unanimous decision win.

Warrington - who prevailed by two scores of 116-112 and one of 116-113 - therefore made a successful first defence of the IBF featherweight title he wrenched from Lee Selby in May and took his perfect professional record to 28-0.

As he had been against Selby at his beloved Elland Road, Leeds fighter Warrington was given little chance of succeeding against the bookmakers’ favourite and former two-weight world champion Frampton.

Warrington, though, made a mockery of those predictions and expects to be given his due credit after upsetting the odds once again.

He said: “I like the (underdog) title, it takes the pressure off.

“There were times throughout (Saturday) where it’s been an emotional roller coaster, thinking ‘am I at this level?’ But then I think ‘don’t be daft. I’ve trained 12 weeks like a demon’.

“Once I stepped into this arena, there was no way I was getting beat. I’ve just got something inside me that just won’t let me get beat.

“Carl Frampton and Lee Selby in the same year, if you’d have said to someone at the start of the year ‘Josh Warrington is going to beat those two back-to-back’, they’d have laughed at you. Maybe people will really start taking note now.

“I’m not the fastest, I’m not the strongest, I’m not the most intelligent boxer or the flashiest boxer in there. I’ve been doubted from English title level all the way to the very, very top but I’m still here and 28-0 now.”

At the press conference following his savage battle with Frampton, Warrington was full of warm words for his beaten foe, saying: “He’s still got my full respect. He’s a tough, tough, tough man.”