Leigh Wood misplaced his WBA featherweight world title after being knocked out within the seventh spherical by Mexico’s Mauricio Lara in Nottingham.
Wood, 31, was forward on all three judges scorecards in an exciting contest on the Motorpoint Arena, however was dumped by a superb left hook and his coach Ben Davison threw within the towel.
Wood sustained a nasty minimize close to his left eye after an unintentional conflict of heads on the finish of the primary spherical and was boxing beautifully earlier than the big-hitting Lara, 24, delivered his knockout blow.
Lara landed a booming proper hook within the second spherical, which buckled Woods’ legs, however the champion responded with some massive pictures of his personal within the third.
Wood was harm once more by a right-left mixture from the Mexican early within the fourth, however once more the Englishman dug deep to complete the spherical strongly.
Lara was visibly harm by a physique shot within the fifth and was caught with one other heavy mixture earlier than being despatched reeling on the ropes within the sixth by an enormous proper cross from Wood.
But simply because the partisan crowd sensed Wood was getting the measure of a harmful opponent, Lara, who inflicted a primary profession defeat on former IBF featherweight world champion Josh Warrington, linked with a shocking left hook.
Wood beat the rely however was clearly on wobbly legs and his nook threw within the towel.
He gained the belt with a final-round stoppage of China’s Xu Can in 2021 and repeated the feat in opposition to Michael Conlan final March in The Ring journal’s battle of the 12 months.
