The Ghana professional boxing league week nine event at the Bukom boxing arena witnessed near chaos following the declaration of a clear split decision in favour of lightweight Benjamin Lamptey as a majority draw.
The technical blunder received spontaneous booing and throwing of missiles, compelling the patrons to flee the stands.
The lightweight contest between Benjamin Lamptey and Eric Asante over six rounds was the 8th of an eleven-bouts night.
Experienced Benjamin Lamptey started slowly, giving the first round to the younger Eric Asante.
Benjamin increased his game, dominating each subsequent round of the encounter.
Media scores at the end gave Benjamin Lamptey a 59-55 win.
The Confusion
One of the three judges, Clement Ashong scored the bout 57-58 for Eric while David Mills and Ishmail Williams, scored it 60-56 and 58-57 in favour of Ben Lamptey.
Strangely, the ring announcer, Mohammed Amin Lamptey, declared the result as a majority draw instead of a split decision win for Benjamin.
The announcement attracted a spontaneous angry reaction from the fans.
There was loud booing from the stands as the corner of the cheated boxer went physical inside the ring.
Water and soft drink bottles, as well as other missiles, began to fly from the stands into the ring.
Before the dust could settle, most of the patrons had filed out from the stands perhaps overly disappointed with three more bouts including a national lightweight championship to go.
Scoring & Technical Decision
A majority draw is deemed in boxing if two of the three judges scored a fight even, but the third judge had one boxer ahead.
The meagre edge in such an instance is not enough for that boxer to be declared the winner hence a draw.
A split decision is a winning criterion in boxing, and other contact combat sports, where two of the three judges score one competitor as the winner, with the third judge scoring for the other competitor.
A split decision, in other words, is a decision that reflects a division of opinion among the judges, like Isaac Dogboe’s win over Joet Gonzalez Sunday morning.
In the WBC featherweight final eliminator, the former junior featherweight world champion, Isaac ‘the Royal Storm’ Dogboe took a hard-fought split decision over two-time title challenger, Joet Gonzalez at the Grand Casino in Hinckley, Minnesota.
The Scores were 96-94 for Joet Gonzalez, 96-94, and 96-94 for Isaac Dogboe.
