Alex Simon disqualified for tripping Tavita Vaoga before Paul Gallen vs Darcy Lussick fight: Video

Australian strongman Alex Simon was disqualified in the second round of his bout with Tavita Vaoga as the heavyweights threw down on the undercard before Paul Gallen stepped up to fight Darcy Lussick.

The fight started with a series of wild, inaccurate swings in the first round. After being warned twice by the referee to stop using his head and grappling — a technique he’s familiar with from his MMA experience — Simon, who was once crowned Australia’s strongest man, tripped his opponent and flipped him onto the canvas.

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To make matters worse, he threw a punch at Vaoga with his right hand while he fell to the deck.

The referee immediately called the fight to an end, disqualifying Simon without a second thought.

“What are you doing? I’m not having that,” the referee said. “You do not throw your opponent on the floor and trip him.”

Main Event commentator Ben Damon called it “one of the most blatant trips you’ll ever see in a boxing ring”.

“Bizarre stuff from the multi-disciplined Alex Simon, who thought he was somewhere else,” Damon said.

“I did have a good chance to chat with Alex Simon during the week. He seems a lovely fellow, but he’s not handling this well at all.

“What he did was very, very blatant and not part of this sport.

“What a bizarre fight we’ve just seen.”

Australian boxing great Jeff Fenech added: “He was trying to show his strength in the wrong areas. He’s definitely a strong man and can punch, but those things are unnecessary.”

Main Event’s Paul Kent also weighed in.

“The deliberate trip, I’ve never seen that before in a boxing fight to that extent. The punch that came in after there wasn’t much in it, but still you’re not allowed to do that,” he said.

“The whole fight, Alex Simon just continued to try and show strong he was. He’s in a sport where you punch the opponent, you don’t wrestle the opponent.

“He was just overwhelmed. I don’t know what the reason was, but he just did not adapt to the sport he was in tonight.

“This is not a street fight. It’s a boxing match and even though sometimes it can get pretty primal inside that ring, there are still rules that have to be followed and Alex Simon just didn’t come tonight to have a boxing match.”

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