Boxing champion Jeff Horn has welcomed confirmation from the WBO of his victory in the welterweight title fight against Manny Pacquiao following a re-score of the fight.
Five anonymous judges awarded seven rounds to Horn and five rounds to Pacquiao after a Filipino Games and Amusement Board request to re-score the bout, with the result prompting a positive response from the Australian at Brisbane Airport ahead of his trip to the USA for the ESPY Awards.
"It gives me evidence behind me that I can just use now. Instead of saying I think I won the fight, now a heap of other people -- professionally -- think I won the fight," Horn said.
However Horn was not as receptive of comments from ESPN's Teddy Atlas after the boxing analyst told Horn in a post-fight interview he thought Pacquiao was the clear winner of the bout.
"He kind of annoyed me a little bit after the fight," Horn said.
"I'm on my highest moment and he's kind of dragged me down straight away.
"I'm not really a big fan any more."
Pacquiao issued a blunt statement in response to the WBO decision, saying, "Let the people judge for themselves. People saw what happened," before continuing, "We have seen worse judgements in the past where judges manipulated results. Nothing surprises me now."
The Filipino Games and Amusement Board were also scathing of American referee Mark Nelson, with chairman Abraham Mitra issuing a statement saying, "We are grateful that WBO acted promptly on our request but no matter what review they do it will be hard to change the result as the referee didn't call it close".