By Mark Vester
Mikkel Kessler suffered the second loss of his career on Saturday night in Oakland, California. The boxer most felt would win the Super Six super middleweight tournament, was battered, bruised and decisioned by the undefeated Andre Ward. Kessler had problems dealing with speed and movement of the much quicker Ward.
There several clashes of heads during the contest. They opened up several cuts on Kessler's face and above both eyes. The cuts forced the fight to an early end in the eleventh round but it didn't matter since Ward was well ahead on the cards and picked up Kessler's WBA title.
Kessler did not deny that Ward was the better man in their fight. The Danish star was upset with the referee in the contest. He felt the ref was biased for the hometown fighter Ward and never gave him any warnings for what Kessler felt were dirty tactics.
"He was the better man tonight," Kessler said to the San Francisco Chronicle. "He threw a lot of elbows and there were a lot of head butts, but [the referee] never warned him. The ref did not stop the holding, and he was punching during the holding."
Ward denies that any of the head clashes were intentional. He says the ref may have stopped a possible knockout when the fight was sent to the cards in the eleventh.
"I'm not a dirty fighter, everybody knows that," Ward said. "He never hurt me. I was a little surprised they stopped it when they did. I had just caught him with a big right hand. Right now I'm dreaming, I don't know what I'm feeling."
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