Puerto Rico's Cotto scores brutal win over Malignaggi

NEW YORK, June 11 (Reuters) Miguel Cotto of Puerto Rico scored a unanimous 12-round decision over American Paulie Malignaggi to retain his WBO junior welterweight title last night at Madison Square Garden.

Cotto (27-0, 22 KOs) won the showdown between the two unbeaten fighters, opening up a cut over his opponent's right eye in the first round.

The cut bothered the New Yorker for the entire fight, as Malignaggi (21-1, five KOs) apparently had trouble seeing because of the blood for portions of the bout against the hard-punching Cotto.

Despite that, the judges scored the fight relatively close, with two of them scoring it 116-111 and the other judge 115-112.

''I'm happy with the decision, and I didn't think it was going to be this tough,'' Cotto told reporters.

Cotto said before the fight he would march in the Puerto Rico Day parade up Fifth Avenue on Sunday and he will now do so still as champion, although he faced a tough test from the determined American, who had many fans from his hometown of Brooklyn, New York in the near capacity crowd.

Malignaggi, considered more of a technical boxer than Cotto, who is known primarily as a puncher, suffered a right orbital bone fracture during the fight and was taken to hospital immediately after the decision was announced. Reports indicated he may have also broken his jaw in the grueling fight.

REUTERS DH HS1232