Round-by-round: Canelo Alvarez outpoints William Scull, fails to shine
Canelo Alvarez regained the undisputed super middleweight championship with a unanimous decision victory over William Scull in a forgettable fight Saturday night in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
Fighting outside Mexico and the U.S. for the first time in his career, Alvarez entered the fight as the WBC, WBO and WBA champion, but wasn’t able to land any significant punches on a very mobile Scull. He won by scorecards of 115-113, 116-112 and 119-109.
Alvarez (63-2-2, 39 KOs) is now moving on to face Terence Crawford on Sept. 12 at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas.
Alvarez unified all four major super middleweight titles with an 11-round TKO over Caleb Plant in November 2021. He made four successful defenses before the IBF stripped him of the title when he decided to fight Edgar Berlanga instead of Scull, the mandatory challenger.
Scull (23-1, 9 KOs) fought Vladimir Shishkin in October for the vacant IBF title and won a controversial unanimous decision. Scull was making his first title defense against Alvarez.
In the co-main event, Badou Jack defended his WBC cruiserweight title with a majority decision victory over Norair Mikaeljan. Jack (29-3-3, 17 KOs) was fighting for the first time in two years. His previous fight was a 12th-round TKO of Ilunga Junior Makabu to win the belt. Jack was scheduled to face Ryan Rozicki, but Rozicki was forced to withdraw in early April with an injury suffered during training.
Mikaeljan (27-3, 12 KOs) entered the fight as the WBC champion in recess, and was riding a four-fight winning streak following a decision loss to Mairis Briedis in November 2018.
Stay here for live updates, results and round-by-round analysis throughout the night.
