Carl Frampton stops ‘Traynwreck’ to move closer to historic bout

Carl Frampton moved along the path toward Irish boxing history at his own pace in London tonight.

‘The Jackal’ played his part in setting up a proposed November WBO super featherweight world title fight with Jamel Herring by stopping Darren Traynor live on ESPN and BT Sports – and now just waits on Herring to successfully defend the strap come September 5.

The 33-year-old handed himself the chance to become Ireland’s first ever three weight world champion with a seventh round stoppage victory over the three time Scottish champ.

The former two weight world champ was never meant to be troubled by the Aberdeen native. However, considering he was training for a much easier fight, the fact the bout actually played out at lightweight and he only fought once since 2018 there were some concerns as to whether peak performance could be reached.

It certainly wasn’t explosive or massively dominant from the Top Rank fighter for the first half of the fight, but he looked comfortable and content to get the rounds and the win.

Once he stepped it up in the sixth the world class accuracy and power told and by the seventh Traynor had enough.

The size difference looked apparent from the off, but Frampton, who will be giving away height and reach to Jamel Herring, looked comfortable either counter punching or getting inside the longer reach. The Belfast man did enough to take a quiet round.

Traynor was busy from range in the second stanza and wasn’t afraid to be physical up close. ‘The Jackal’ was able to counter on occasion and looked to be working in second gear in another close round.

The former world champion did up the intensity in the third, landed some good jabs and eye catching right hands, but did the Scot did have some moments of success in as a relatively even paced fight progressed.

The Top Rank fighter took the fourth and fifth in a similar fashion to the previous rounds, landing the cleaner shots in another relatively uneventful two rounds.

Frampton added more weight to his shots in the sixth. Some right hands of note landed before a right and left to the mid rift saw Traynor consult the canvas. To his credit the Scott rose to his feet, but the writing looked on the wall.

The Jamie Moore trained fighter sensed as much and continued to be the aggressor coming out in the seventh. He tested Traynor’s chin twice before another beautiful body shot saw his opponent asking to be withdrawn from the fight.

The referee obliged and Frampton moves closer to his three weight world title goal.