Oscar left to ponder next move

De La Hoya: Badly beaten

My guy was just too young and too fresh for him. He needs to retire. After the fight he told me: 'I just don't have it any more'.

Freddie Roach
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Oscar De La Hoya will think long and hard about whether to fight on after his stunning defeat by Manny Pacquiao on Saturday night.

The Golden Boy looked a faded shell of the man who won 10 world titles in six weight divisions as he was bludgeoned to defeat by the pound-for-pound king in the MGM Grand in Las Vegas.

De La Hoya went into the fight as the odds-on favourite due to his big size and weight advantages.

But in the end he was taken apart by the speed and aggression of the Filipino buzzsaw, being stopped on his stool after round eight.

Smart

He said afterwards: "My heart still wants to fight - that's for sure. But when your physical doesn't respond what can you do? So I have to be smart and I have to make sure I think about my future plans."

De La Hoya was classy in defeat, heaping praise on his brilliant conqueror.

He said: "Manny Pacquiao is a great fighter - he deserves all the credit in the world. He fought a tremendous fight and he was a better man and he deserves all lthe accolades. I wish him all the best.

"He's just a great fighter, I have nothing bad to say about him. He prepared like a true champion.

"I'm not shocked because at this stage when you face a great fighter like Manny it's always expected. I worked hard and I trained hard but like I told people in the gym it's a whole different story.

"My style is to go forward and to fight and Manny boxed on his toes really well. He waited for me to make the mistakes and he deserves everything."

Pacquiao meanwhile said he and trainer Freddie Roach prepared for the fight with the assumption that speed would be their biggest asset.

He revealed: "We thought speed would be the key of the fight. That's what we were working on and I used it tonight. I trained hard and that's why I deserved it. I still think Oscar is a good fighter.

"I hit him with a lot of hard punches in the last two rounds and I didn't think he could last through the 12 rounds."

In the build-up to the fight the war of words between Roach and De La Hoya was one of the biggest subplots to a fascinating script.

Roach right

Roach had claimed Oscar could no longer pull the trigger, and said Pacquiao would annihilate him. He was proved exactly right on both counts.

"I trained Oscar (against Mayweather Jr) and I thought he looked very sluggish in the Forbes fight. I thought he couldn't pull the trigger any more and I was proved right.

"My guy was just too young and too fresh for him. He needs to retire. After the fight he told me: 'I just don't have it any more'.

"He's been a great champion, he's a great guy. I love Oscar, the time we spent together was great and I hope there's no hard feelings between us."