By News Editor 
Benavidez got his first experience as a light heavyweight versus a formidable ex-champion in Oleksander Gvozdyk. His speed and technique along with natural athleticism were obvious to the announcers for FOX Deportes MX. As an aside, their announcing style is a lot easier to follow along because of their much more detailed narrating the fight that say a DAZN or PBC on Amazon broadcast.
Dominant Half For Benavidez
The physical presence of Oleksander’s Gvozdyk was impressive. He was able to land some shots for the duration of the 12 round fight largely due to Benavidez’ occasional lack of head movement. However, Benavidez was in an upright stance that allowed him to punch Gvozdyk repeatedly with a brawler’s intention and redundancy, but occasional fast fluries.
Gazelle Punches in the third round from Benavidez showed a new wrinkle to his game. In fact, as Benavidez finished with extreme velocity landing a nine-punch combination with the first sextet of punches at the body and the rest to the chin.
Benavidez essentially won the fight by the end of the sixth round. At that point, the dominance was diminished from David since the volume and lack of effective response from Gvozdyk made for a fairly boring end of the fight.
Criticism of Benavidez
Unfortunately, for some boxing fans, a victory is not enough from David Benavidez. While he emerged victorious in the light heavyweight debut, defeating Oleksandr Gvozdyk to clinch the WBC Interim Light Heavyweight World title, boxing twitter was abuzz with comments about Benavidez’s performance. He showed his mettle despite being in a different weight class and enduring a tough camp due to a cut suffered during training. The tenacity of Benavidez could also be seen in his determination to continue fighting even with this injury, showcasing his commitment to the sport and his fans. This victory confirms the boxer’s return to the Super Middle class, further expanding his record to 29-0, with 24 by means of a knockout. Response to this victory was varied on social media.
Some fans voicing suspicion over the intensity of Gvozdyk’s effort in the match, stating his performance stayed in first gear, but, perhaps, the Ukrainian was hoping to counter punch and test his chin. However, the Mexican Ecuadorian fighter had the ability to maintain a steadfast volume from every direction.
Still, others see Benavidez in a different light. There were remarks which downplayed his capability, saying that he’d struggle against boxing giants like Bivol or Beterbiev. This notwithstanding, Benavidez’s dream of challenging undisputed super middleweight champion Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez remains alive. However, Canelo’s camp has dismissed these claims as hype, stating that the Mexican champ had ample reasons not to fight Benavidez.