{"id":919909,"date":"2026-10-04T05:14:09","date_gmt":"2026-10-04T05:14:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/919909\/"},"modified":"2026-10-04T05:14:09","modified_gmt":"2026-10-04T05:14:09","slug":"whittaker-survives-late-scare-to-hold-on-for-points-win-over-wallace","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/919909\/","title":{"rendered":"Whittaker survives late scare to hold on for points win over Wallace"},"content":{"rendered":"

Whittaker made an extravagant entrance, accompanied by a live string ensemble playing WWE star The Undertaker’s theme before switching to “Icon” by Karen.<\/p>\n

Despite being from nearby West Bromwich, Whittaker was greeted by as many jeers as cheers from the roughly 5,000 fans inside the arena.<\/p>\n

The fight came alive in the third when Whittaker briefly staggered Wallace with a shot that skimmed his forehead.<\/p>\n

Wallace’s travelling support made themselves heard, only to be drowned out by an airhorn smuggled into the arena as Whittaker found his rhythm<\/p>\n

Among those in attendance were former UFC champion Leon Edwards and American Cassondra Gainey, who travelled nearly 4,000 miles from North Carolina<\/a> after Whittaker’s social-media videos helped lift her spirits during cancer treatment.<\/p>\n

Wallace offered a warning of what was to come when he landed a heavy left in the sixth. <\/p>\n

“Stay focused. Just because you’re comfortable, don’t get lazy,” trainer Andy Lee told Whittaker, who regained control before an almost disastrous 10th round. <\/p>\n

Wallace hurt him with a thudding southpaw left before Whittaker walked on to a huge shot and looked in serious trouble.<\/p>\n

Whittaker briefly got some respite when Wallace was warned for punching on the break, but he continued pushing forward as a major upset suddenly felt possible.<\/p>\n

Whittaker hit the canvas three times in the final round, none ruled knockdowns, as Wallace threw everything at a visibly tiring opponent.<\/p>\n

By the end, Whittaker had done enough to win – but not without giving Wallace and his support reason to wonder what might have happened with a little more time.<\/p>\n

“I only have myself to blame,” he said. “I feel like I’ve got the best support in the world. This felt like my home show tonight even though it’s in Birmingham.”<\/p>\n

Promoter Eddie Hearn welcomed the possibility of a rematch: “We know Ben is in the position to fight the winner of Bivol-Smith but it’s likely that won’t be until next summer, so he needs to fight in the interim.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Whittaker made an extravagant entrance, accompanied by a live string ensemble playing WWE star The Undertaker’s theme before…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":919910,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[447],"tags":[703,49,48,82],"class_list":["post-919909","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boxing","tag-boxing","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/919909","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=919909"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/919909\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/919910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=919909"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=919909"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=919909"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}