Joseph Parker is still bitter about the referee stopping the fight in the 11th round in his fight against WBA interim heavyweight champion Fabio Wardley last Saturday night, on October 25th at the O2 Arena in London.

Three Punches, One Too Many

Parker (36-4, 24 KOs) insists that Wardley (20-0-1, 20 KOs) had gassed out in the 11th after he’d flurried on him after stunning him. He says that he was “aware of what was happening” when Warley threw his last three punches before referee Howard Foster stopped the fight.

It didn’t look like Wardley had gassed out enough to stop throwing. Of the last three punches that Wardley threw, he landed one big left and missed the other two. He didn’t look like he was going to stop throwing, and there was still a minute to go in the round. There was too much time left for Parker to continue to absorb punishing shots.

Parker’s Version of Events

“I was ready to continue. There was no point where I wanted to stop the fight. I was going to finish strong because I think he blew himself out,” said Joseph Parker to Ariel Helwani’s YouTube channel, talking about his loss to Fabio Wardley last Saturday night.

The referee, Howard Foster, was watching closely, and he obviously felt that Parker had taken too much punishment for him to allow the fight to continue in the 11th round. Parker wasn’t throwing due to fatigue and being hurt.

“I was leading on the scorecards. In the 11th round, when he had that flurry, there were some punches that caught me, and also, I was dodging and moving and weaving. When he threw the last three punches, I was aware of what was happening. When the ref jumped in, I said, ‘I’m fine,'” said Parker.

Stats Don’t Lie: Only Seven Punches

What Parker is failing to say is that he’d been badly hurt late in the 10th round, and was lucky the fight wasn’t stopped. In the 11th, he looked punch-drunk and wasn’t throwing. Indeed, Parker threw only seven punches in total during two-thirds of the round. There was only 1 minute and 6 seconds remaining, and he was getting shellacked by Wardley.