Sergey Kovalev destroyed Jean Pascal in their light heavyweight fight on Saturday night in Montreal, but he did so in an unsportsmanlike way.
The “Krusher” (29-0-1, 26 KOs) admitted after the fight that he extended the bout in order to continue administering punishment to Pascal, whose corner eventually stopped the fight after the seventh.
“This was a personal fight because Pascal is a special person. I mean that he is not polite with anybody who is around him and (he) don’t respect fighters. Everyone in Montreal said, ‘kick his a–,'” Kovalev told HBO’s Max Kellerman after the fight in his best English.
Kellerman asked specifically if Kovalev extended the fight to continue punishing Pascal. Kovalev said he did.
“Yes, I would fight more rounds and make him more pain. Punish him more. I don’t respect him at all.”
There was beef between the men dating back months. Not only did Kovalev beat Pascal in March 2015, but Pascal called Kovalev a racist prior to their rematch. That was due to Kovalev posting a picture on Twitter of a monkey in boxing gloves and calling it Adonis Stevenson.
While Kovalev deliberately tried to extend the fight despite the one-sided beatdown, there is no excuse for the referee not stopping the fight prior to the seventh. The contest should have been called during the fifth when Pascal was being brutalized. As it was, Kovalev landed 165 punches to Pascal’s 35. What does that tell you? The guy took an extra couple rounds’ worth of punches for no reason. Kovalev should not be proud about that.
