Persoon outguns Taylor in female unification battle, dire scorecards make Taylor champion.

In the most important bout of both girls careers, respective female champions, Katie Taylor 14-0 (6 Ko’s) and Delfine Persoon 43-2 (18 Ko’s) met last night for the unified women’s lightweight title at Madison Sq Garden in New York.. Taylor started the bout the more composed, using angles and meeting the aggressive Belgian walking in.. Persoon soon cut the distance off and started to walk down Taylor causing some panic in the Irish girls corner.. By round 6 Taylor was looking more ragged, from having to physically fight off the relentless Persoon, who was starting to win rounds.. The physical nature of the later rounds saw both girls marked up, most notably Persoons left eye, but it was the Belgian who was landing first with the more significant shots.. By the end of round 9, the commentary team at Sky Sports and DAZN had Persoon comfortably leading, with the gritty WBC champion appearing to edge the final session, however shockingly two of the scorecards favoured Taylor by 2 rounds, with the third even (96-94, 96-94, 95-95) leaving a shocked New York crown unconvinced that Taylor had done enough to be crowned unified champion.. A tearful Persoon left the ring upset at the injustice while an unkempt Taylor tried to convince the DAZN interviewer that she was certain that she had done enough to win.. Paulie Malignaggi at ringside commented that he was literally speechless at the decision.. Eddie Hearn now moves his highest female priority forward to the most viable low risk defence available.. This was shameful judging which has left its mark in one of the biggest fights in female boxing history.