Well folks on Saturday night we got to see something special, we got to see Jorge Linares get back to his absolute best as he took Anthony Crolla to peices over the 12 rounds . Most people expected a Linares win but the way in which he went about this victory sent a message out to the rest of the division .

From the off Linares looked sharper,quicker and more accurate than Crolla and although  there was not a lot to cheer it was obvious that Crolla had a mountain to climb if he was to win back his world title . As the early rounds crept on past Jorge Linares quickly worked his way thru the gears , catching Crolla out with his wide variation of punches to which Crolla had little to no reply . Crolla was taking a massive amount of punishment  trying to get inside and force Linares backwards , but the few times he did get inside he done something that was ludicras , he covered up, stood static and tried to throw single shots , i really couldn’t believe what i was watching . The first time these two had met Crolla was on a bit of a good run and although he was clearly outclassed in that fight he was a threat and did give Linares problems , this time Linares was even better but Crolla looked like a shadow of his former self, he looked as if he lacked belief and by half way i had Linares up by six rounds and really on cruise control . In the seventh Linares was really opening up on Crolla and even sent him to the canvas with a lovely upper cut Crolla didn’t even see coming , and it did for a bit look as tho the end was near but Anthony Crolla showing some great heart seen out the round . The trip to the canvas seemed to wake Crolla up because he took the eighth, but still only landing single shots and never really putting Linares in trouble, but it did look for a while that Linares might have gassed but that wasn’t to be for Crolla , Linares was just having a round off . In the closing rounds Linares went back up the gears the ,Crolla was struggling and there was very little coming back but Crolla having the heart of a lion would not stop coming forward . At the end of the eleventh as Crolla made his way back to his corner, Crolla and his trainer Joe Gallagher seemed to have a confrontation , Gallagher was trying to stop the fight going into the last round but after some pleading Crolla came out and stuck on in until the end to take some pride  in taking  it to the cards, but it was only a formality as all judges had scored it 118-109 , this really was a masterclass from Linares setting him up nice for Mikey Garcia to see who’s the No1 in the division .

So what next for Crolla ?

I think there is only one logical route for Crolla and thats to finally demand Eddie Hearn give the fans the fight they want, Crolla v Flanigan ,two lads from the same city who went to the same school fighting for a world title , that fight sells big , if nothing else it could be a massive check out fight for Anthony Crolla ,but already Hearn has put road blocks infant of this fight demanding Crolla gets £1m purse for the fight which is insane for a guy coming off two losses and holds no belts .

Now onto Joe Gallagher, Saturday night was a disaster for Gallagher and any fighter worth there weight will leave or stay well clear of this outdated dinosaur. I said in my preview to this fight Gallagher must leave his ego at the door but very early on in the night we seen that could never happen . Youngster Marcus Morrison was left in the ring by Gallagher to be savagely beaten from pillar to post for ten rounds , a fight that shouldn’t have went past the sixth, and really did become painful to watch to the point Tony Bellew on commentary was pleading for Gallagher to stop it to no avail . Then in the main event Crolla was sent out with the same boring domestic level tactics of high guard ,no head movement and just to walk forward onto severe punishment from a world class operator in Linares , bizarrely Gallagher had seen enough after eleven rounds and tried to stop it , Crolla is an experienced boxer who had 3 mins left to fight for pride and Gallagher tried to pull him out , yet let a youngster fight be humiliated for most of the ten rounds earlier in the evening ………madness .

Steven Donnell