Nakatani claims big win and Oguni scores rare stoppage in Tokyo, Condes and Jaro both score wins!1/11/2014 Korakuen Hall, Tokyo, Japan
The first OPBF title fight of the new year took place today and saw a new champion crowned as Masayoshi Nakatani (7-0, 5) managed to claim the biggest victory of his career. Nakatani, stepping up big time to challenge Yoshitaka Kato (26-5-1, 7) for the OPBF Lightweight title, may have been viewed by many as taking the fight too soon though showed exactly why so many rate so highly. Despite coming in to the bout with just 21 rounds of career experience Nakatani looked like a veteran at times. He made the most of his sizable reach and height advantages to make Kato fight from range and also made the defending champion pay for his lack of accuracy in the later rounds with great counters. With this victory we expect Nakatani to move into the world rankings. Prior to the bout Kato was ranked by both the WBC and WBO (#10 in both) and it'd not be a shock if Nakatani moved into a similar position when the rankings for those organisations were updated. Sure he's not ready for any of the active world champions but he's certainly a man who we think will be fighting on the world stage over the following few years. With his size, power, skill and developing experience this kid will be going a very long way. In the chief support bout, at least in terms of professional contests, there was a rare stoppage victory for the promising Yukinori Oguni (12-1, 3). Oguni, a former OPBF Super Bantamweight champion, took time to get going though didn't really struggle with Yuki Fujimoto (7-3-1, 2) who suffered his first stoppage loss via an 8th round stoppage. Although Oguni was stopped last year by Shingo Wake we've no doubt that this young kid has the potential to make his mark on the world stage. The least surprising result on the card saw Yusuke Sakashita (11-4-2, 7) take a stoppage over Thai tomato can Petchek Sithkorpolkanpim (0-12) who suffered his 11th career stoppage via this second round loss. In a disappointing result the highly touted Kenji Kubo (3-2-1, 1) fought to a split decision draw with Kota Sato (9-5-1, 4). Kubo, who began his career with a very impressive decision over Nouldy Manakane, appears to have flopped and is now starting to look very unlikely to ever live up to his potential. Of course credit needs to go to Sato here though in all honesty it's hard to hide our disappointment over Kubo's career. If Kubo suffering a draw was disappointing then it's fair to say that Yusuke Suzuki (4-1, 3) scoring a 3rd round KO over Takaaki Ishikawa (10-5, 5) was a delightful surprise. Of course Ishikawa hasn't got the greatest chin, suffering 5 stoppage losses now, but it was still a very solid win for Suzki who is still a novice himself. As well as the competitive bouts on the show there was also the Heavyweight spar of Nobuhiro Ishida (25-9-2, 10). Ishida, a former Japanese Light Middleweight champion, shared the ring with Yamato Fujinaka (4-3, 1) and seemed to do relatively well. There were issues with his sparring but it's expected that he will be given a Japanese ranking and he will be able to challenger Kyotaro Fujimoto on April 30th. It's not yet confirmed but indications are suggest that the JBC ranking committee WILL grant Ishida a Heavyweight ranking. Barangay. Namayan Basketball Arena, Mandaluyong City, Metro Manila, Philippines As well as the show in Tokyo there was also action in the Philippines thanks to Aljoe Jaro. This card, which had made headlines before it had even started, turned out to be a pretty interesting one for numerous reasons. With 13 fights on the show, yes, you read that right 13 fights, it was bound to have talking points and that's certainly what we got. The lowest level bouts on the card were a trio of 4 rounders. These saw Joel Tamayo (1-1) taking his first victory courtesy of a 4 round decision over the debuting Jeromias Aguinaldo (0-1); Joyjoy Formentera (2-1) winning a tight split decision over Jeffrey Alejandre (1-2) in an excellently made bout, and a good stoppage victory for the promising Rolly Sumalpong (3-0, 1) who stopped Rodney Ramirez (0-1-1) in the 4th and final round. The card amazingly had 7 bouts scheduled for 6 rounds. Surprisingly only 3 of those bouts actually went the distance. These distance bouts saw Rowel Rosia (6-2, 3) score a very credible win over Lionel Legada (11-6-1, 5) with a unanimous decision, Danilo Gabisay (5-2, 3) scoring a narrow victory over Regan Delos Santos (2-2-1, 2) with a majority decision whilst the unbeaten Joey Canoy (4-0-1, 3) was unexpectedly held to a draw by Felipe Cagubcob Jr (1-1-4) who is starting to become an expect in scoring draws. Of the other scheduled 6 rounders the longest lasted 5 rounds as Jonathan Francisco (5-3, 2) struggled to finish off Mac Mac Canisio (2-4-1). This was somewhat the opposite of Lloyd Jardeliza's (5-0-3, 4) 159 second blow out of the fragile Marco Niones (3-11-1, 1) who suffered his 9th stoppage loss. For us some of the most noteworthy results came in the other 6 rounders. One of those was a 3rd round victory scored by the very promising Neil John Tabanao (6-0, 5). Tabanao, fighting Warren Mambuanag (6-4-2, 3), showed why he is so highly regarded as he dropped Mambuanag in the opening round before finishing him in round 3. The second noteworthy result in the 6 round bouts saw former IBF Minimumweight champion Florante Condes (26-8-1, 22) stopping journeyman Marzon Cabilla (9-11-1, 4). On paper this shouldn't be noteworthy though it is for several reasons. Firstly this was Condes's first bout in well over a year and his first win since 2010. Both interesting facts, though the key is that Cabilla was supposed to be a better opponent, despite being a very late replacement, than Condes's original opponent Rey Morano who the GAB refused to sanction for the bout. If Cabilla, who lasted just 133 seconds, was better then just how bad do the GAB think Morano is? In the shows sole 8 round bout, the unbeaten Ardie Boyosi (9-0-1, 6) stopped the experienced Prell Tupaz (8-23-4, 1) in just 111 seconds as he showed off why his is touted as a really credible prospect. Tupaz might have collected losses but he has rarely been stopped and actually came in to this bout following an 8th round technical decision loss to one time world title challenger Sylvester Lopez. We believe the card had 2 bouts scheduled for 12 rounds. One of these saw Jomar Fajardo (13-4-1, 6) claim the new Asian Boxing Federation (ABF) Light Flyweight title courtesy of a 3rd round stoppage over the limited Robel Villegas (9-8, 3), whilst the other again brought question marks to the GAB. Former WBC and Linear Flyweight champion Sonny Boy Jaro (35-13-5, 25), originally scheduled to fight Pit Anacaya, instead took on Charlie Cabilla (13-13-4, 2) and took him out inside a round. Cabilla, a late replacement for Anacaya who the GAB said was an unfit opponent for Jaro, was also unfit though with the matchmaker given less than a week to sort out an opponent it's questionable as to what the GAB expected. Auditorio Benito Juárez, Veracruz, Veracruz, Mexico In Mexico things went as expected for a trio of Filipino's who were thrown in hard and expected to sink. Things for Vergel Nebran (11-7-1, 7) went exactly as most would have expected, with the Filipino being stopped by former WBC Super Flyweight world champion Tomas Rojas (42-14-1-1, 28). In fact if anything was surprisingly here it was how long Nebran lasted, refusing to be stopped early on he survived until round 8 against the rangy Mexican fighter. Rojas wasn't the only former world champion beating up on a Filipino foe as Ramon Garcia Hirales (19-4-1, 12), the former WBO Light Flyweight champion, over came Lionel Mark Duran (11-10-2, 5) in what looked like a mismatch on paper. Although the expected winner won Duran impressed by refusing to be stopped The closest a Filipino came was Adones Aguelo (20-9-2, 12) who gave Mexico's Nery Saguilan (27-4-1, 10) a good run for his money in a competitive 10 round bout. Aguelo, who was narrowly beaten, proved he was on an even keel with Saguilan and a rematch in a neutral venue may well see the decision reversed.
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