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Manny Pacquiao dominates Chris Algieri to retain title

Manny Pacquiao, right, punches Chris Algieri during their welterweight title fight at The Venetian in Macao on Sunday. Pacquiao won in a 12-round decision.
(Xaume Olleros / AFP/Getty Images)
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Manny Pacquiao badly wanted his five-year knockout slump to end Saturday. It didn’t, but the consolation was impactful.

Pacquiao produced a six-knockdown destruction of previously unbeaten Chris Algieri, a six-pack of additions to his power-punching highlight reel.

“Manny is the best in the world,” Algieri said. “He’s in there throwing bombs, trying to get you out of there every single round.”

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Pacquiao’s rout was evident from start to finish and seen in the lopsided 119-103, 119-103, 120-102 scorecards that favored him in the World Boxing Organization welterweight title fight at the Venetian Macao’s Cotai Arena.

Algieri (20-1) argued he slipped when dropped from a three-punch combination in the second round, but there was no disputing any of the other times he was dropped.

Pacquiao (57-5-2) knocked down Algieri twice more in the sixth round, two times in the ninth and again in the 10th.

“The master boxer was given a master class by professor Pacquiao tonight,” Pacquiao trainer Freddie Roach said, a jab at the New Yorker’s masters degree in nutrition. “All [Algieri] did was run.”

Pacquiao repeatedly found him, however, decking Algieri with a combination ended by a left that forced Algieri to fall in a backward somersault. A short right again sent Algieri to the canvas.

The champion’s best punch was a left that caught Algieri flush on the left side of the jaw in the ninth round, the confident 30-year-old confessing he was hurt by the blow.

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Pacquiao posed after the blow, sending a message of some type, whether it be that he still has the “fire in his heart” he vowed remained in this camp, or whether he was making an expression to renew pressure on Floyd Mayweather Jr. for a fight in 2015.

“I really want that fight, the fans deserve that fight,” Pacquiao said.

Pacquiao followed the power blow in the ninth round with an attack that dropped Algieri while backed to the ropes.

A combination capped by a left clinched the sixth knockdown, in the 10th round.

“Tonight, I did my best,” Pacquiao said. “I’m satisfied. I was looking for the knockout. … I worked a lot more on my power. I came to fight.”

Algieri said he was looking for an opportunity to land his own powerful display, but it never came.

Pacquiao’s punching volume dominated Algieri’s interest in jabbing and being mindful of the champion’s famed power.

“Not necessarily [looking] to knock him out, but to slow his pace,” Algieri said, taking some solace about some of his work in the 12th round.

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By then, it was over.

Earlier, Jessie Vargas of Las Vegas and Vasyl Lomachenko of Ukraine successfully defended their junior-welterweight and featherweight belts, respectively, and Zou Shiming of China set up a Februaryflyweight title shot with a triumph.

Vargas beat Antonio DeMarco of Mexico by unanimous decision.

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