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A controversial split decision in a Scottish super lightweight title fight last February could lead to VAR scoring in an upcoming rematch between the two fighters.
Champion Josh Taylor of Scotland narrowly defeated challenger Jack Catterall of England on 26 February, although Catterall knocked Taylor down in the eighth round and emerged safely ahead on points. The judges, however, awarded the victory — along with the WBO, IBF, WBA and WBC titles — to Taylor by scores of 114-111, 113-112 and 112-113.
“Today I should have woken up with all the belts,” Catterall posted on Instagram 24 hours after the verdict. “…Boxing, shame on you…Dreams stolen.”
Since then, promoter Ben Shalom has been working to secure a rematch that could potentially include VAR technology similar to that used globally in football. A second fight is now tentatively scheduled for March in Glasgow, Scotland, along with discussions about implementing automated scoring in boxing for the first time.
“I actually spoke to Robert Smith [chief of the British Boxing Board of Control] about that,” Shalom told talkSport.com. “We’re going to put a lot of pressure on for this fight to have [VAR]-we’ll see. I hope next year is when we will see a different way of judging the top games. Look at what we have now with football, with VAR.”
“[It] could [be] two judges…in a truck [watching on screens] also, judging at the same time as the three next to ringside. There are opportunities now, perhaps if everyone is open to taking boxing to a place it has never been before. That fight is so important because of the outrage it caused, and that’s what gives us the impetus to try to make a change.”
February’s shared decision created vitriol in Europe, starting with an investigation by the British Boxing Board of Control and fiery remarks from British House of Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle, a native of Catterall’s hometown who called the score “a travesty of justice.”
At the same time, an upset Taylor (19-0, 13 KOs) made it clear that he would give Catterall (26-1, 13 KOs) a rematch in the super lightweight division at 140 pounds. Taylor ducked so many other mandated opponents in the past year – to make another fight happen – that he was stripped of his IBF, WBA and WBC titles.
That publicity partly led Shalom to pursue VAR: “This is something we’re really trying to push and also very confident that we could see in the next year or two, yes…We’re talking about the help of technology, and we may be talking about referees who can see things back at the very highest level.”
