Dalton Smith whipped up the crowd at the Sheffield Arena in Sheffield, England, with a surprising fifth-round one-punch body shot knockout over the former three-time world title challenger Jose Zepeda (37-5, 28 KOs) to win the vacant WBC silver light welterweight title on Saturday night on DAZN.
Smith, 27, unloaded with a well-timed right to the body of the 34-year-old Zepeda, sending him down hard on the canvas. The badly hurt Zepeda stayed down for the full 10-count and didn’t get up for a while from the hard punch from Smith, which had caught him unprepared. The contest was stopped at 1:25 of the round.
The southpaw Zepeda fought well in the first four rounds, following Smith around the ring, and hitting him with hard lefts to the head. Smith was very wary of Zepeda’s punching power after getting nailed flush by a hard left in the first round. After that, Smith was on his bike, showing little interest in mixing it up with Zepeda.
After the fight, Dalton called out EBU 140-lb champion Adam Azim. That’s more of a backward move on Dalton’s part because Azim isn’t ranked in the top 15 by any of the four sanctioning bodies, and he doesn’t help him prepare for a title fight against WBC champion Devin Haney. Promoter Eddie Hearn wants Smith to fight for a world title.
It does make sense for Smith to get more experience before he fights for a world title at 140. The way he fought tonight, he’s not ready for any of the top five contenders or champions at 140.
Ryan Demolishes Harper in Welterweight Defense
WBO female welterweight champion Sandy Ryan (7-1-1, 3 KOs) easily destroyed the game but limited Terri Harper (14-2-2, 6 KOs) by a fourth-round stoppage after dominating the entire fight.
Harper’s corner threw in the towel after the fourth, realizing that she was taking too much punishment from the stronger and much busier Harper.
Campbell Hatton Suffers First Loss
Campbell Hatton (14-1-5 KOs) suffered the first loss of his career in a 10-round unanimous decision to the highly skilled Jimmy Joe Flint (14-1-2, 3 KOs). The scores were 98-92, 97-94, and 97-95.
Flint was too advanced of a fighter for Campbell to deal with at this early stage of his career and was lucky not to be knocked out. Flint had Campbell in serious trouble in the eighth and tenth rounds from his hard punches.
