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Odlanier Solis' bout with Vitali Klitschko ended prematurely in the waning seconds of round one, as Solis stumbled awkwardly and badly injured his knee. He beat the count with the help of the ropes but the referee stopped the fight, even though the round had ended.
Solis was barely hit before he fell, but he stumbled and stepped awkwardly with his right leg as he moved away from Klitschko following a lunging attack of his own. Until then the first round was largely uneventful as Klitschko stalked, occasionally scoring, and Solis countered mostly with roundhouses then quickly returned to his peekaboo defense with his gloves tight to his temples. But the brief action in the early minutes suggested that the fight might have become interesting had it continued.
The loss is Solis' first, and minutes after the fight he was still on the stool with trainers looking at his leg. Though Solis had lost a lot of weight for the fight, he still wasn't in the kind of shape he was as an amateur, and he was trying to utilize more foot movement than he'd ever needed to use as a heavyweight before. This presumably put a lot more pressure on his knees than he is used to, and normally he doesn't duck and dodge as much as he was trying to do against Vitali.
Immediately after the referee stopped the fight, Klitschko moved toward him to confront him while he was still on the ground. Vitali appeared to be mocking him; perhaps he didn't know that Solis' knee was hurt, or thought he was faking it and taking a dive? Certainly, the last seconds of the first round would be an unusual time to do so, and on such a tepid punch.
Either way, Klitschko was the winner of a very unsatisfying fight. Solis' future might be uncertain depending on the severity of the injury. He is now 17-1, while Klitschko is 42-2.
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