Usyk avoids shock defeat with 11th-round stoppage of Verhoeven
Key takeaways
- The world heavyweight champion is pushed by the former Dutch kickboxer to 11 rounds in Egypt.
- It took until the fourth for Usyk to have a round that was clearly his, but the champion was unable to capitalise on it with the bigger and heavier Verhoeven still taking the fight to him.
- Scorecards published by The Ring magazine afterwards showed two of the three judges had the fight tied 95-95 going into the 11th of 12 rounds and the other had Verhoeven ahead 96-94.
Why this matters: an international story with cross-border implications worth tracking.
The world heavyweight champion is pushed by the former Dutch kickboxer to 11 rounds in Egypt.
xwhatsapp-strokecopylinkgoogle Add Al Jazeera on Googleinfo Ukraine's Oleksandr Usyk celebrates after defeating Rico Verhoeven of the Netherlands during their WBC world heavyweight championship 'Glory in Giza' boxing match at the pyramids of Giza, Egypt [Khaled Desouki/AFP]By Reuters Published On 24 May 202624 May 2026Ukraine’s unbeaten heavyweight world champion Oleksandr Usyk has stopped Dutch former kickboxer Rico Verhoeven with one second left in the penultimate round of a WBC title fight to avoid one of the greatest boxing upsets of all time.
The “Glory in Giza” fight, held at the pyramids of Egypt on Saturday, was considered a mismatch, but Verhoeven, whose sole previous professional boxing fight was 12 years ago, tore up the script in mind-boggling fashion from the opening bell.