Sunny Edwards (21-2, 4 KOs) announced his retirement after losing to Galal Yafai (9-0, 7 KOs) by sixth round TKO in their WBC interim flyweight title fight at Resorts World on Saturday night Arena in Birmingham, England.
(Credit: Mark Robinson/Matchroom Boxing)
“I don’t want to be here”
The beginning of the end tonight came in the fifth round when Yafai unleashed a barrage of punches on a trapped Sunny, who was pinned to the ropes, unable to break out as he was forced into place by the size of the much larger man.
In the sixth, Yafai again bullied Sunny on the ropes and boomed with an unanswered flurry, leaving the referee no choice but to step in and stop the match. The time of the stoppage was at 1:10 of the sixth round.
Early Signs Of Trouble
Yafai, 31, had Sunny in trouble in the opening seconds of the first round and unloaded on him with a flurry of punches that had the former IBF flyweight champion in trouble. Sunny made it out of the ring but looked in trouble in the second round. Between the second and third, Sunny told his corner, “I don’t want to be here.”
His coach tried to give him a pep talk, but he didn’t respond in the subsequent rounds. Sunny looked mentally unengaged and unmotivated, and he didn’t show the eagerness for fights that he had shown in the past. His confidence was knocked out of him in his ninth round stoppage loss to Jesse ‘Bam’ Rodriguez on December 16 last year.
It was a similar fight to the one tonight. Sunny fought a much bigger and stronger bam. He couldn’t be matched in size or in the power department. Tonight was the exact same thing. Yafai won on size alone.
As big as he was, he should have fought at featherweight against the likes of Rafael Espinoza instead of Edwards. It was amazing how much bigger Yafai was than Sunny tonight. That would explain why Yafai looked so exhausted at Friday’s weigh-in. He looked terrible cut down to 112, like a stick figure.
Edwards just didn’t have the size or the power to compete against the hulking Yafai, who looked like a featherweight (126 lbs) inside the ring tonight.
There was no way the diminutive Sunny, 28, could handle the bigger Yafai, who used his size by repeatedly pulling him on the ropes and holding him there with hard thrusts.
Yafai’s humble victory
“Sunny is a great champion, but I had to work my ass off for him. I was worried going into the camp, knowing how good Sunny was,” Yafai said Matchroom Boxing after his sixth round knockout victory over Sunny Edwards tonight.
“That’s how I always approach it. I wanted to test him out,” Yafai said about why he started so quickly in round one. “I think people underestimated me. I don’t want to brag too much, but I won an Olympic gold (2020). I faced the best boxers in the world. The Kazakhs, the Cubans, and great boxers like Sunny. So, I was used to that style.
“It was just my night tonight. Maybe on another night Sunny would have hit me. Sunny is a technical boxer; he is upstairs. He is a former world champion. He is #1 in Ring Magainze. he got there for a reason. We had great spars, but battles are different.
“Winning a gold in the Olympics is the best achievement I could ever do, but tonight beating Sunny was a better feeling than actually standing on the podium. That’s just how good Sunny is,” Yafai said.
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