After a battle with Covid-19 knocked out his chances of fighting in 2020, Daniele Scardina returned from his long layoff to score his own KO.

The super middleweight contender rebounded from a slow start to knock out Cesar Nunez in the eighth round of their scheduled 12-round smasher at Allianz Cloud in Milan, Italy.

Scardina snagged a vacant secondary 168-pound title with the victory and notched his first knockout win since November 2018.

Scardina had not fought since October 2019, when he defeated Ilias Achergui by 10-round unanimous decision, which also took place at Allianz Cloud.

But despite the emphatic finish, it was not all sunshine and rainbows for Scardina early on.

Onwards and upwards 👏 @EddieHearn Facetime’s Daniele Scardina to congratulate him on tonight’s win 🙌 #ScardinaNunez pic.twitter.com/gn10odMu0i

— Matchroom Boxing (@MatchroomBoxing) February 26, 2021

In round three, Nunez connected with a hard left hand that clearly hurt Scardina. But just when he was about to jump in to capitalize, referee Giovanni Poggi warned both fighters to watch their heads, killing Nunez’s momentum.

Scardina took some hard shots from Nunez against the ropes in round six. However, he managed to rebound late with a left hook downstairs.

Scardina went back to boxing in round seven and worked consistently behind his jab, which caused significant swelling under Nunez’s right eye.

That was when the 28-year-old Scardina (19-0, 15 KOs), a native of Italy based in Miami, discovered the blueprint to defeating Nunez.

In round eight, he snapped Nunez’s head back with stiff jabs and mixed in some hard right hands that drew blood from his nose. A visibly exhausted Nunez swung for the fences, but Scardina used his superior head movement to evade the punches.

A short right uppercut badly discombobulated Nunez, and Scardina sent him sprawling across the ring from a follow-up barrage of punishment before crashing to the canvas. Poggi immediately called a halt to the fight at 2:55 of round eight.

Spain’s Nunez (17-3-1, 9 KOs), 35, has dropped three of his last four contests, all three coming by way of knockout.

In the chief support bout, Maxim Prodan scored a controversial 10th-round stoppage of Nicholas Cristofori.

The victory marked Prodan’s second defense of his secondary 147-pound title.

The unbeaten Prodan (19-0-1, 15 knockouts), 28, a Ukraine native based in Italy, dominated most of the action.

Late in round five, Prodan connected with a left hand behind the ear that sent Cristofori to the canvas for the first time.

The 26-year-old Cristofori (11-3-2, 1 KO) appeared to lose his balance in the 10th round and gestured towards the canvas. Prodan saw an opportunity and connected with a big left hand that opened up a deep cut around his opponent’s right eye. The referee then immediately stopped the fight, which drew the ire of boxing fans and commentators alike.

The time of the stoppage was 1:50 of the 10th and final round.

Rounding out the rest of the undercard, Nicholas Esposito (14-0, 5 KOs) outpointed Tobia Loriga (32-9-3, 6 KOs) over 10 rounds to remain undefeated. Mirko “Terminator” Natalizi (10-0, 7 KOs) terminated Islam Teffahi (22-9-2, 5 KOs) in the fourth round of their scheduled eight-round junior middleweight affair. And 126-pounder Vincenzo La Femina (7-0, 3 KOs) dominated Pablo Narvaez in an eight-round unanimous decision rout.