KSI vs Logan Paul: Battle of YouTube stars ends in draw – as it happened

We bring you every jab, hook and diss track, while attempting to put this new media monstrosity in context...

KSI vs Logan Paul weigh in

In front of 18,000 fans at the Manchester Arena, YouTube stars KSI and Logan Paul shared the spoils after six rounds of tense white-collar boxing.

While many may pour scorn on a matchup between two amateurs, more than 800,000 streamed the event, billed as the “biggest event in internet history”, at its peak.

At least a half a million more watched on illegal streams, despite the attempts of the organisers to quash them.

The match was the second bout for KSI, who defeated Joe Weller in front of a 7,000-strong sellout in London’s Copper Box Arena back in February.

Fans not able to make it to Manchester for the fight had to pay £7.50 ($10) for the privilege of watching a live stream of the action.

:: Chris Stokel-Walker (CSW) reporting live from the MEN Arena and Adam Hamdani (AH) following all the online reaction

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More than a quarter of a million pounds of bets on the outcome of the event had been taken by British bookmakers by Saturday afternoon, The Independent can exclusively reveal.

“We were blown away by the numbers we saw after KSI's last fight, but that pales in significance in truth, with interest from a betting perspective likely to hit £300,000 by close of play on Saturday night,” said Ladbrokes’ Alex Apati.

Key Points

• How to watch the fight
• How did we get here?
• Trash talking commences
• Rematch talks already

[25 August 2018 17:57 · Adam Hamdani]

Just asked Harry Hugo of the GOAT Agency, an influencer marketing agency for his thoughts on 400,000 people paying $10 to watch YouTubers box.

"YouTube is coming," he says. (CSW)

[25 August 2018 18:01 · stokel]

The live crowd are loving MOMO's dancing. (CSW)

[25 August 2018 18:02 · Adam Hamdani]

The difference in skill is pretty obvious here.

MOMO has supposedly been training for just seven days and you can tell in the way he throws those punches, almost like a cat. He's also focusing mainly on how his Fortnite dancing looks at every opportunity.

Considering RossiHD's advantage in terms of practice, he hasn't looked much better. Probably about a 10-9 round to Rossi considering he landed cleaner more often. (AH)

[25 August 2018 18:04 · stokel]

Overheard up here in the nosebleed seats: "MOMO's dominating, isn't he?" (CSW)

[25 August 2018 18:05 · Adam Hamdani]

MOMO comes out and puts a lot of pressure on Rossi from the off but his lack of power (although he can seriously take a punch) is just obvious.

This is the kind of fight where the boxing experts and those who don't approve of this kind of event do a collective sigh. MOMO probably applied more pressure in the second, so we'll give him the 10-9. (AH)

[25 August 2018 18:08 · stokel]

Massive (and I mean massive) roar for the end of that round live here as RossiHD eventually mounts an attack. (CSW)

[25 August 2018 18:09 · Adam Hamdani]

RossiHD takes the final round with a 10-9 for me, it was another silly one. MOMO's lack of training was obvious, a bit silly really. (AH)

[25 August 2018 18:11 · stokel]

At the risk of starting every one of my posts with "for some context...", for some context, 450,000ish streams (which Adam tells me this event is at), puts this nearly double the number of buys of an average UFC pay per view. As one media watcher just told me, "Mad." (CSW)

[25 August 2018 18:12 · Adam Hamdani]

Incredible. MOMO with his seven days of training takes the W.

He then celebrates in style and RossiHD couldn't look any more annoyed if he tried. A big shock. (AH)

[25 August 2018 18:15 · Adam Hamdani]

Just look at that. Whether you're a fan of the event and the stars of the show or not, this is big. Chris tells me that most people at the event are getting their merchandise at the moment but it's expected that around 18,000 people will be at the MEN for the main event.

That. Is. Big. (AH)

MEN Arena