Lamont Roach Jr became extremely close to dethroning WBA lightweight champion Gervonta Davis last month.
The 29-year-old from Washington, D.C. took the unbeaten three-division world champion all the way in a 12-round thriller on March 1, with the fight being declared a split decision draw.
‘Tank’ Davis took a knee to the canvas during the ninth round after being on the receiving end of a Roach jab, but referee Steve Willis failed to call an official knockdown in what has been brandished as a bizarre decision by fans and pundits around the world.
With a rematch now expected to take place during the Summer, Roach has spoken out and weighed in on why the result wasn’t overturned despite numerous calls for this to happen.
Speaking to Andre Ward on ALL THE SMOKE FIGHT, the 29-year-old revealed exactly why the result will remain a draw, despite the mistake being made to not call an official knockdown during round 9.
“So the real reason was, if it had been scored a knockdown, there’s no definite outcome of how Gervonta would have responded or fought with the remaining rounds to go. What I took from that is basically ‘yeah, we messed up, but somebody gotta take the fall’ and it ain’t gonna be him, so they owned up to it like ‘alright, we missed this’, they owned up to it but they’re just saying ‘alright, we’re not gonna overturn it though’.”
Roach will now be given another opportunity to become a two-weight world champion and the first fighter to hand ‘Tank’ Davis a professional defeat, with a second encounter between the lightweight stars expected to be made official in the coming weeks.
