Marie-Pier Houle was aggressive. She fought boldly until the end. But she had to admit defeat by unanimous decision in front of the Briton Sandy Ryan, Saturday, in Wales.

The Quebecer saw the WBO welterweight title slip through her hands.

The fight got off to a good start for the Terrebonne native, who showed up in the ring with a smile to the sound of Metallica’s Fuel. Houle was incisive from the sound of the bell and did not slow down in the first round, multiplying the strikes in front of a very defensive Ryan from the start.

As Houle had expected, the Englishwoman went there with uppercuts and punches to the liver at the start of the fight, but the Quebecer managed to avoid them well. It was in the fourth round that the pace picked up a notch; Ryan took the upper hand attacking with a series of precise jabs.

Houle, shaken and with a bloody nose, was visibly beginning to lack energy. She struggled to regain control of the duel. “Stop chasing [her],” her trainer, Sébastien Gauthier, told her after the sixth round.

MPH listened to him and was more patient in the next round. She seemed to have a boost of energy in the eighth round. She was nevertheless a victim of Ryan’s combinations, whose face was still intact. The latter also went there with a powerful and violent uppercut in the ninth.

Houle never gave up, executing his plan to “throw, throw, throw” shots until the final bell. But the Englishwoman in front of her seemed unshakeable.

More details to come.