Lovemore N’dou is past it. He’s 39 years old and hasn’t got much speed or pop to his punches anymore. But he still had enough left to make Mexican prospect Saul Alvarez look mediocre on Saturday night. N’dou is a very durable fighter and covered up well against the new pride of Mexico, never taking any serious punishment. Alvarez controlled the fight, but again his poor defense was there for all to see as Lovemore landed 32% of his power punches on the kid. At 20 years old, Canelo has a lot left to learn and this fight with N’dou was valuable experience, but there’s no denying that the fans were expecting fireworks and only got a few real thrills. This is the second time in a row Alvarez has fought a 39 year old opponent and it may to time to step it up some if the fans are going to stick around.

Alvarez landed 52 of his power punches in the final three rounds to put an exclamation point on his win; N’dou only got in 16 during that same time-frame. It seemed that Alvarez was looking more to outbox his man than to stop him, which is abnormal for the kid, but even when he threw harder shots he never seemed to hurt Lovemore at any time. He stayed mostly on the outside pushing though the jab. He never got reckless, didn’t go headhunting, and never really varied the tempo. He did enough to win the rounds handily and left it at that. The final scorecards read 119-109, 120-108, and 120-108 all in Alvarez’s favor. This fight counts as a defense of Saul’s light middleweight WBC Silver title even though both men weighed in at only 149 pounds.

Saul’s trainer Eddy Reynoso was quoted as saying, “we started with Saul when he was a little kid and he is not lacking anything. He is on top right now, and regarding his technique – it’s better than what many of the current champions have – so we are not really worried about what people think.” Alvarez improves to 35-0-1 with 26 knockouts with this win. Meanwhile N’Dou drops to 48-12-2 and is barely a gatekeeper in the division. The fight was held at the Estadio Beto Avila in Veracruz, Mexico.

Related posts:

1. Saul Alvarez steamrolls Cuello for the WBC Silver
2. Saul Alvarez to fight Luciano Cuello in Mexico July 10