Over the course of 12 rounds on Saturday night, “GGG” took on an unfortunate new meaning for Gennady Golovkin, as his chances of securing ‘justice’ in his trilogy with Saul “Canelo” Alvarez were rapidly going, going, and then gone at last.
Judging controversies marred the rivals’ first two encounters, in 2017 and 2018, denying Golovkin one if not two victories over Canelo, and the irony on this occasion was that the Kazakh might have finally been on the ‘right’ end of one, had he not left it too late to start firing. But leaving it late was the theme of this bout, which pitted a prime Canelo at 32 against an aged Golovkin at 40, and that factor gave way to a disconcerting tentativeness in GGG, who rallied late but was in truth not worth the 116-112, 115-113, 115-113 scorecards – all of which favoured Canelo, in any case.
September, the T-Mobile Arena, and stupefying scorecards have been staples of this rivalry, with only the division varying this time around as the middleweight foes clashed at super-middleweight, as Canelo put his IBF, WBC, WBA and WBO titles on the line. Re-live the final meeting between Canelo and GGG, below.