By Rick Reeno

MGM Grand, Las Vegas - Freddie Roach, trainer of  Viktor Postol (28-1, 12KOs), admits he underestimated the physical gifts of Terence Crawford (29-0, 20KOs).

Last  night, Crawford scored two knockdowns and won a twelve round unanimous decision over Postol to unify the WBO/WBC junior welterweight world titles. The lopsided scores were 118-107, 118-107, 117-108.

The fight was evenly fought in the early rounds, but once Crawford scored two knockdowns in the fight - it was one-way traffic with a dominating performance.

The biggest factor that surprised Roach was Crawford's speed and his variety of punches.

“His speed was just unbelievable. He was just too fast,” said Roach. “He surprised me with his talent.”

Once the fight started slipping away, Roach began urging Postol to get a knockout around the eight or ninth. Postol did try to press a little more in the final two rounds, but he was still never able to land anything of note to change the fight around. At the end of the day, Roach credits Crawford's speed as the determining factor in the way the fight played out.

"After the fourth round things started going the other way. Around the eight or ninth round, I told him that we needed a knockout to win the fight. In the last few rounds we fought as hard as we could. But he was too much, his speed we couldn't keep up with him," Roach said.