Amalie Arena, Tampa, Florida - In the opening bout of the PPV telecast, Australia’s Liam Paro (22-0, 13 KOs) rebounded from an early knockdown to win a split-decision victory over Puerto Rico’s Yomar Alamo (20-1-1, 12 KOs) in a closely-contested 10-round junior welterweight bout. Two judges scored the fight 95-94 and 96-93 in favor of Paro, while one judge favored Alamo 95-94.

“I kept levelheaded after the knockdown, hats off to him for that,” said the 25-year-old Queensland native.

“I shook it off after the first round and just did what I had to do to win. I established my jab, that was the most important thing. Alamo gave me a hell of a fight but we stuck to the gameplan and prevailed in the end.”

In the opening round, it was the 26-year-old Alamo who drew first blood. With Paro letting his guard down, Alamo landed a counter right-hand that followed a short left hook. Paro, who made his U.S. debut and fought outside of his native Australia for the first time, hit the canvas for just the second time in his career.

However, Paro didn’t panic and used his activity, jab and body attack to string rounds together and build a lead that he wouldn’t relinquish. He held advantages of 497-333 in total punches thrown, 31-12 in body punches landed and 43-13 in total jabs landed. Two of the three judges gave rounds two through six all in favor of Paro. Despite dropping rounds nine and 10 on all three judges’ cards, Paro did enough to keep his unblemished record intact.

“I’m just going to chill out back in Australia, enjoy Christmas and get back to the gym next year to secure a world title,” Paro said.