Errol Spence v Terence Crawford: undisputed welterweight championship – live

Unbeaten Americans meet to unify all four welterweight titlesSpence v Crawford: the best matchup boxing can deliverSend Bryan a tweet at @BryanAGraham or email him

Some more historical bric-a-brac as we count down toward the main event. We’ve already mentioned how tonight’s feature attraction is the first undisputed welterweight championship fight in boxing’s four-belt era, which dates back to either 1988 or 2004, depending on who you ask. (Don’t ask.)

Additionally, Spence-Crawford is only the fourth welterweight title unification fight between unbeaten champions. The other three:

Donald Curry (WBA, IBF) v Milton McCrory (WBA) in 1985

Felix Trinidad (IBF) v Oscar De La Hoya (WBC) in 1999

Keith Thurman (WBA) v Danny Garcia (WBC) in 2017

The Ragamuffin Man’s seventh-round victory ranks second only to Randolph Turpin’s 1951 victory over Sugar Ray Robinson as the greatest upset in British boxing history as many classed Curry as the world’s best pound-for-pound fighter. Bobby Neill, who trained the Bermondsey fighter, remembers: “Nobody gave him a chance. All the press were talking about how many rounds it would go before Curry knocked him out. But I have never seen anybody so fixed in his belief that he would win as Lloyd. His training and mental attitude were unbelievable.

“Curry could punch with both hands and was a brilliant boxer but we reckoned he was open to left hooks to the body. Lloyd just went through the jabs and broke him up to the body. He had no fear, no trepidation and I have never seen a boxer who was given no chance be so completely and absolutely dominant. To go into a foreign country and win like that against a man like Curry was amazing.”

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