LAS VEGAS — Canelo Alvarez never really hurt Julio Cesar Chavez, Jr. last night but he never let him into what became a decisive boxing lesson at the T-Mobile Arena either.

For nearly all of what became a one-sided points victory for the former middleweight and present WBO junior middleweight champion, Alvarez controlled the ring with his hand speed, accuracy and enough harsh right hands and uppercuts to convince Chavez that this was a night to concentrate on survival not victory.

In the final two rounds the crowd booed robustly because of Chavez’ unwillingness to engage and Alvarez' decision not to push too hard to make his point. For two guys who claimed they had deep animosity toward the other it was, frankly, a somewhat muted ending to a fight that was not in doubt from the halfway point on.

Judges Dave Moretti, Adelaide Byrd and Glenn Feldman all ruled emphatically for Alvarez, 120-108, each giving him every single round. The Herald was only slightly kinder, scoring the bout, 119-110, for Alvarez, giving Chavez the seventh round and scoring the first a draw since neither did a thing in the opening three minutes.

Predictably, when it was over, Chavez declined to take responsibility for his performance, implying the battle plan of his new trainer, Nacho Beristain, had derailed him.

“I wanted to box but he went to the ropes and I just needed to throw more punches,’’ Chavez said later from behind a puffy face and half-closed eyes. “I would’ve attacked more, I would’ve been countered by his punches. Nacho told me to do that, but the strategy didn’t work.

“We wanted to fight in the middle of the ring. When he went to the ropes I didn’t have the strength to get him. He was very good. He knew what he was doing in there. He didn’t risk too much.

“The speed and the distance was the key. I didn’t feel that much power because I felt dwindled, I couldn’t throw as many punches as I wanted. My father kept telling me to throw more punches from the ringside.”

Truth be told, if you throw sporadically and catch regularly it doesn’t matter what the plan was because you didn’t execute it. You executed yourself and your chance at victory, as Chavez did last night.

Wisely, Alvarez deflected some of the crowd’s disappointment when he announced immediately after the fight that he had agreed to face unified middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin Sept. 16 in this same T-Mobile Arena. That turned the booing that had washed over him and Chavez during the final two rounds into cheers, and when Golovkin showed up in the ring all was forgotten because Alvarez had delivered both a victory and news of a fight the boxing world had coveted for the past four or five years.

Interestingly, Chavez had entered the ring first to thunderous applause and a smattering of boos. It would be the reverse on the way out.

Alvarez, meanwhile, surprisingly received a more mixed reaction. While he may be the most popular fighter in Mexico, he was not in Las Vegas. At midweek he was a 7-1 favorite, but by last night Chavez supporters had bet him down to 4-1. Usually it’s said the “smart money’’ comes in late. Last night it was the dope’s dough.

“Tonight I showed I could move, I could box, I showed as a fighter I can do all things,” Alvarez said. “I thought I was going to showcase myself as a fighter that could throw punches, but he just wouldn’t do it (engage).

“I’ve shown I can do lots of things in the ring, anything a fighter brings — I’ve shown I can showcase myself. I wanted to try something new. I never sit down in sparring and I didn’t want to sit here. GGG —y ou are next, my friend. The fight is done. I’ve never feared anyone since I was 16 fighting as a professional.

“When I was born, fear was gone. I never got my share of fear. I’ve had difficult fights, and that will no doubt be a tough fight. But, I always say, Canelo Alvarez is the best because I fight the best."

He was facing far less than that in Chavez. Things started slowly with both taking a cautious approach, mostly fighting from the outside and keeping a safe distance. Chavez landed his jab with some effectiveness and Canelo managed to land several quick flurries in the first two rounds but neither was imposing his will on the other.

Alvarez was landing the heavier blows and finding ways to slip in close without paying a price despite Chavez’s 3-1/2 inch reach advantage. Chavez failed to use his size advantage with any kind of regularity.

With about a minute left in Round 4, Alvarez finally caught Chavez with a big right hand that sent the sweat flying off Chavez’ face. He then landed the first of what became three short uppercuts, each of which caught Chavez hard in the face when he tried to move inside. From that point Alvarez began to turn up the pressure and Chavez was unable to find a safe punching distance from which to respond.

When he thought he had found one midway through Round 5, he ate a solid right hand as Alvarez continued to bore in on him with the patience of a paid assassin, which in a sense he was, scoring ever more frequently with hard rights to the head and body that were beginning to unravel Chavez like someone picking at loose threads on an old sweater.

Alvarez chose to take most of the sixth round off, standing with his back against the ropes as Chavez moved in and landed, but nothing that had enough behind it to change the arc of the fight. Alvarez made that clear when he came out the next round and landed two hard flurries early, absorbed a brief assault from Chavez on the ropes, and came off them to slam a hard combination to the head and body that drove Chavez back in retreat.

This fight was beginning to resemble Chavez’ loss to then-middleweight champion Sergio Martinez five years ago on a night when he seemed totally baffled and bewildered by the man attacking him until he suddenly rallied in the final round and a half and nearly knocked Martinez out. By the eighth round last night, there was little sign of the latter but a stinging replay of the former as Alvarez built up a wide points advantage with a steady, two-fisted attack that seemed to leave Chavez no punching room as he absorbed more and more punishment while dishing out little of his own.

Chavez (50-3-1, 32 KO) was never hurt, but he was hurting as the fight wore on and he wore down during the final four rounds. After each, Chavez slumped on his stool, tired and confused, while Alvarez stood between rounds as if anxious to get back to work.

By the 10th round, Chavez’ face had begun to grow puffy and his eyes seemed to have a look of resignation. He continued his fruitless search for openings but no longer with authority. He was now mostly circling and in retreat, like a wary homeowner approaching a hornet’s nest filled, he knew, with a dangerous cargo he was not anxious to challenge.

The record-setting crowd of 20,510 at T-Mobile began to boo as the action slowed, Chavez taking few chances and Alvarez seemingly content to maintain what he knew was by the final round a broad lead on a night when he had put together a comprehensive victory.

Considering how one-sided a fight it had become by then, who could blame them?