Bizarre mistake sees Badou Jack and Richard Rivera fight FOUR MINUTES ROUND during Oleksandr Usyk fight against Anthony Joshua undercard
Badou Jack and Richard Rivera took a rare four-minute round due to a chaotic timekeeper error in their Saturday night fight in Saudi Arabia.
The heavyweight clash sparked controversy over the Oleksandr Usyk vs. Anthony Joshua undercard as it also ended in a controversial split decision.
Former super middleweight champion Jack has previous world title fights against British champions George Groves and James DeGale.
He beat Groves in 2015 and drew with DeGale in 2017.
Jack also moved up to light heavyweight and beat Nathan Cleverly for a secondary belt, but was unable to dethrone Adonis Stevenson in his world title fight in the division.
Now, at 38, he’s at the cruiserweight level.
In this new division, he looks far from the best of his youth as he sometimes struggled to overpower Rivera during their fight.
To his credit though, Jack fought his way back into the contest and had particular success towards the end of the eighth round.
This was helped by the shocking error of the timekeeper.
As usual, the clock on the TV screen disappeared as the round reached its three-minute conclusion.
To the surprise of fighters, commentators and viewers however, the bell did not ring.
Instead, the pair continued to fight for another minute, during which Jack had great success.
At the end of the fight, some argued that it helped him win the split decision.
The judges scored the contest 96-94, 96-94, 94-96, with two in favor of Jack.
Rivera was far from happy with the loss.
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