In combat sports referees are simply there to keep an eye on the action, but occasionally they can catch a stray punch.
And that is exactly what happened to the referee for the main event at Saturday night’s Glory Collision 5 kickboxing event.
Antonio Plazibat nearly scored the wrong kind of knockout on Saturday June 17, he landed a big right at a referee.
In a wild scene, Plazibat accidentally knocked down referee Edward Strijkert with a nasty right hand late in round two of his main event fight against Tariq Osaro at GLORY Collision 5. Plazibat and Osaro were battling against the ropes in the final seconds of the round when the bell rang and Strijkert dove to separate the fighters, but he landed a late punch from Plazibat, which immediately knocked Strijkert to his knees. He is not the first referee to suffer this kind of action.
Luckily, Strijkert was able to walk away relatively unscathed and GLORY officials brought in a new referee to finish the fight.
In the end, Osaro (25-2-1, 13 KOs) defeated friend and teammate Plazibat (22-5, 16 KOs) by fifth-round knockout to capture the interim heavyweight title from GLORY.
