Leigh Wood gained revenge on Mauricio Lara by unanimous points decision as he regained the WBA featherweight title with an impressive display.
Lara, 25, stopped the 34-year-old Englishman in February but vacated the belt on Friday after failing to make weight for this rematch in Manchester.
The Mexican’s sluggish movement was in contrast to the clever, dominant performance of Wood.
Wood knocked down Lara in round two and never looked in trouble thereafter.
The judges scored it 118-109, 116-111 and 118-109 in his favour.
“I should’ve done that first time around,” Wood told BBC Radio 5 Live. “He’s tricky – if you switch off he will put your lights out. I was so focused, so driven, I was never going to fail no matter what.”
Wood gains revenge with dominant display
Wood was the only fighter at AO Arena who could leave with the belt – had the Mexican won, the title would have been left vacant.
However, Wood never looked likely to give up the opportunity to reclaim the belt he first won in July 2021 as he made amends for the previous defeat to Lara, when he looked on top before being stopped in the seventh round.
Wood had clearly learned his lessons, putting on a much more defensively secure and technically assured performance.
Lara, meanwhile, looked to run out of ideas early on and despite a 4lbs weight advantage and facing an opponent who had gone through a weigh cut, he rarely troubled his opponent.
The tempo was set in round two, when a right uppercut instantly followed by a short left saw Wood knock his opponent to the canvas.
Lara got up quickly, but was now on the back foot and never recovered his composure as a partisan crowd roared on Nottingham-born Wood.
Wood continued to attack with big punches right and left, and not even a cut suffered near his left eye in round four could stop his flow.
That cut did become more of an issue and had to be tended to by his corner, however it was ruled to have been caused by an accidental clash of heads, so the fight would have been decided by scorecard if it resulted in a stoppage – and Wood always looked ahead.
The final six rounds saw Wood keep Lara at arm’s length, with stabs to the body causing the Mexican particular issues.
Forest fan Wood calls for City Ground clash
At the final bell, Wood immediately raced to salute the crowd, before calling for a homecoming fight at Nottingham Forest’s football stadium.
“It’s amazing. There’s only one thing that can top it and that’s fighting at home at the City Ground,” he told DAZN. “It will be the next one or the one after.”
Into his mid-30s, Wood admitted he only has a limited number of top level bouts remaining – and wants to hit all his dream targets before he is done.
He called out Luis Alberto Lopez for a unification bout, after the Mexican stopped Michael Conlan in his own back yard of Belfast earlier on Saturday night in their IBF featherweight encounter.
Wood also said he would be keen to face Josh Warrington – however, fighting at Forest’s ground is the big one.”I probably have two fights left, City Ground one, unification another. I want my happy ending,” he said.
