Robert Helenius pummels Adam Kownacki again, wins by DQ
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Robert Helenius proved his first victory over Adam Kownacki was anything but a fluke.
The Finnish heavyweight, who stopped his American counterpart in the fourth round in March of last year, delivered a terrible beating before Kownacki was disqualified for low blows on the Tyson Fury-Deontay Wilder card at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
Helenius (31-3, 19 KOs) set the tone early, hurting Kownacki (20-2, 15 KOs) with a straight right and closing his left eye with about 30 seconds left in the opening round.
The fight didn’t change much after that, with Helenius landed punishing blows either from range or when his aggressive opponent charged at him.
Kownacki never stopped trying but couldn’t land with any consistency or avoid Helenius’ punches, which did more and more damage as the fight progressed.
Kownacki seemed desperate by the third round, when he was warned for landing a low blow. He lost a point for the same foul in Round 5. Then, seemingly on the verge of getting knocked out in Round 6, he landed one more shot below the belt and was disqualified.
The official time of the stoppage was 2:38.
Helenius was asked how he felt about the disqualification.
“Either way, it would’ve been a stoppage,” he said. “I had very hard hits on him, he didn’t have any on me.”
Helenius has now won three consecutive fights since he was stopped in eight rounds by Gerald Washington in July 2019.
Kownacki, who seemed to be nearing a title shot before his first meeting with Helenius, will have to fight simply to regain relevance in a competitive division.
