Ermal Hadribeaj beat the count. The bell had rung. And the referee still waved it off.
That three-sentence sequence is why Saturday night at The Chelsea at The Cosmopolitan still has boxing Twitter arguing 36 hours later — and why Sebastian Fundora’s fourth WBC super welterweight title defence landed differently than it looked on first watch.
The official result is a TKO at 2:59 of round 12. Fundora retains. Hadribeaj drops to 23-1-1. But whether that last second punch should have ended the fight at all is a legitimate question — and it is the most interesting one to ask about an evening that was otherwise a textbook Fundora performance.
Read our pre-fight preview and prediction for full fighter profiles and pre-fight analysis.
| Sebastian Fundora | Ermal Hadribeaj | |
|---|---|---|
| Age | 28 | 33 |
| Record (after) | 25-1-1 (17 KOs) | 23-1-1 (8 KOs) |
| Height | 6’6” / 197 cm | 5’11” / 180 cm |
| Reach | 80” / 203 cm | — |
| Stance | Southpaw | Southpaw |
| Nickname | The Towering Inferno | The Sniper |
Hadribeaj came prepared. According to DAZN’s Chris Mannix on commentary, his camp had specifically sparred with taller fighters to simulate Fundora’s southpaw length. The plan in round one was to crouch low, throw a stabbing jab at the chest, and bait the champion into standing tall — then fire looping shots over the top.
It worked. Hadribeaj took round one on the live scoring and kept the fight from becoming a jab-and-move-away contest that would have allowed Fundora to operate at distance. By round three, the fight was a phone booth battle. That cost Hadribeaj: referee Thomas Taylor deducted a point for excessive holding — though DAZN analyst Sergio Mora suggested he was simply trying to smother an opponent six inches taller. Either way, Fundora went into round four up 29-27 per the scorecard.
A looping right hand from Hadribeaj found Fundora’s chin in round four, the kind of shot that his 2023 defeat to Brian Mendoza had raised as a recurring vulnerability. Fundora sent him back to his corner bleeding from the mouth.
The middle rounds were a slog. CompuBox numbers from the broadcast showed Fundora had landed just nine of 106 jabs through round six — an ugly 8.5% accuracy rate — as Hadribeaj’s smothering kept disrupting the champion’s timing. But the output differential was already building. Fundora was throwing constantly; Hadribeaj was getting through less and less.
By round eight, a Fundora uppercut popped Hadribeaj’s mouthpiece half out. The right side of the challenger’s body was visibly bruised. The live blog scoring showed Fundora ahead 77-74, and those numbers understate how much punishment the challenger was absorbing.
“I told the ref in the fourth round that I was hurting him,” Fundora said after the fight. “I kept landing body shots and was looking for that special shot to get him out of there. I was hitting him in the rib cage the whole time with the left hand and when I went up the middle, I heard the noise that he made.”
By round ten, Hadribeaj was breathing with his mouth open wide, blood visible. The live score was 98-92 Fundora — two points already gone from Hadribeaj’s total. In round eleven, Taylor warned Hadribeaj at the 1:47 mark and deducted a second point less than a minute later. One round left, and Hadribeaj needed a knockout to win a fight in which he had already been deducted two points.
Fundora walked Hadribeaj corner to corner in the final round, throwing one-twos, short left hands, hooks, and uppercuts. Hadribeaj was sluggish. The CompuBox split for the final six rounds shows Fundora outlanded him 124-70 — nearly two-to-one — in the second half of the fight.
Then Fundora landed a long, straight left hand in the closing seconds. Hadribeaj went down hard.
And the bell rang.
Hadribeaj got to his feet. He was dazed but vertical. Referee Thomas Taylor assessed him, decided he could not continue, and waved the fight off — ruling it a knockout at 2:59.
The controversy: The dispute is not about the rules — the Nevada Unified Championship Rules, in line with the ABC Unified Rules, are explicit that a boxer who has been knocked down cannot be saved by the bell in any round. The fight turns on a timing question: did that left hand land before the bell, or after it? The Ring reported the punch landed just before the bell. Terence Crawford, Timothy Bradley, and Dan Rafael each objected that the bell had already sounded when the punch connected — Crawford specifically said, “The bell rung before the punch landed.” Hadribeaj’s sparring partner Mykal Fox also stated the punch preceded the bell.
What Crawford and Bradley objected to was the stoppage itself. Bradley: “I love Thomas Taylor. He’s one of the best in the business. But just like fighters can have an off night, referees can too, and he had an off night tonight.” Crawford: “He got to his feet. He deserved to go the distance.” Rafael called for the Nevada State Athletic Commission to change the result, noting the timing appeared illegal. As of this writing, no official NSAC action has been announced. The timing dispute remains unresolved.
| Fundora | Hadribeaj | |
|---|---|---|
| Total landed | 202 | 144 |
| Body shots landed | 56 | — |
| Last 6 rounds landed | 124 | 70 |
| Power shots R11 | 18 | — |
Sources: CompuBox (202-144 total, 56 body shots, 18 R11 power shots via premierboxingchampions.com; 124-70 last-six-round split via @CompuBox on X)
The volume story is unambiguous. Over twelve rounds, Fundora outlanded Hadribeaj 202-144 — a 40% edge in total output. The 56 body shots are the mechanism: they tired Hadribeaj’s legs, opened the ribs, and made the straight punches to the head harder to absorb as the fight wore on. The second-half split (124-70 over rounds 7-12, per CompuBox) confirms the pattern — Fundora accelerated as Hadribeaj faded.
What CompuBox does not resolve is the final punch’s timing. That question sits with the NSAC.
| Date | Opponent | Result | Round |
|---|---|---|---|
| Oct 17, 2026 | Ermal Hadribeaj | TKO W | 12 |
| Mar 28, 2026 | Keith Thurman | TKO W | 6 |
| Jul 19, 2025 | Tim Tszyu (II) | UD W | 12 |
| Mar 22, 2025 | Chordale Booker | TKO W | 4 |
| Mar 30, 2024 | Tim Tszyu (I) | SD W | 12 |
Source: boxing_data production records
Four title defences in 19 months. Across those five fights, Fundora has been stopped or hurt — notably, Hadribeaj landed some clean shots on Saturday night, and Fundora went back to his corner with blood from the mouth in round four. The Mendoza KO (April 2023) remains the single data point that keeps opponents believing a big right hand can still find a home. Hadribeaj found it twice. He just could not build on it.
“We want undisputed,” Fundora said into Mannix’s microphone. He was not subtle about the target: “We’ll break either Jaron Ennis or Josh Kelly down. Just like the last guy and the guy before that.”
Jaron “Boots” Ennis currently holds the IBF and WBC (interim) titles at 147 pounds and is expected to move up. Josh Kelly holds the IBF super welterweight strap. A fight between them has been discussed; Fundora has been waiting for that outcome to build a unification.
The performance on Saturday strengthened his case. He absorbed a game challenger’s best plan, wore it down through sheer volume and body work, and finished in the twelfth. The controversy over the finish is real — but Fundora was already ahead on every card by a wide margin. Even if the NSAC retroactively changes the outcome to a UD, the belt stays in Coachella.
This is worth a paragraph. The Albanian challenger came into the fight 23-0-1, mandatory by WBC ranking, with an organised game plan and the conditioning to execute it. He had legitimate moments — Fundora bled from the mouth in round four — and the two-point deduction tells you he was still competing in round eleven.
He lost clearly on the cards. Whether the final TKO stands or becomes a UD on the record, his first professional loss came in a world title fight against a legitimate champion who outworked him by 58 punches over twelve rounds.
The card lost its original co-main event when Brandon Figueroa missed weight Friday, was stripped of the WBA featherweight title by the scales, and then withdrew on the morning of the fight citing illness. Armando Reséndiz vs Koen Mazoudier was elevated into the co-main slot at short notice and delivered: Reséndiz won a unanimous decision 98-92, 97-93, 97-93. Also on the card: Jaime Osuna edged Cristian Cangelosi on a majority decision, and Marco Romero delivered a first-round stoppage.
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