Piriyapinyo defends PABA title; Asians struggle in Australia

Friday was once again a day in which Thai TV showed off one of their talented fighters as former world title challenger Chonlatarn Piriyapinyo (47-1, 30) was in action.

Piriyapinyo, best known for his 2012 loss to Chris John in Singapore, scored his 3rd victory since his set back to John as he stopped the completely over-matched Jovill Marayan (8-13-3, 3). Marayan is now 1-3 in his last 4 bouts with all 3 of those losses coming by stoppage.

On the same card as Piriyapinyo's bout, fellow Thai Thongtaeng Muangsima (4-2) also scored a victory out pointing the Thai based Chinese fighter Jen Yu Jia (2-5-1, 1).

There was also victories for Paithong Muangsima (2-1, 1) and Angor Sor Saenkamrang (1-0, 1) as well as a draw between Anrey Sor Saenkamrang (3-1-1, 1) and Petchnatkan Bangmod Sport (0-0-1).

It wasn't a perfect day for Thai's however as Saming Chopchai (0-2) suffered his second successive stoppage loss in Australia. Chopchai was stopped in the second round by Australian novice Jake Ellis (2-0, 2).

In fact in Australia it wasn't a good day for Asian's in general with Filipino Michael Dan (3-4-1, 1) also suffering a stoppage loss. Dan was stopped by the doctor at the end of round 3 in his bout against Ben Capps (5-1-1, 2). And Aussie based Filipino born Rey Anton Olarte (17-23-8, 4) was out pointed Michael Zerafa (11-0, 5). Although interestingly Olarte did score a knockdown in round 3 of their 10 round bout.

The one Asian fighter who did have success "down under" was Jack Asis (29-18-4, 15). The Australian based, Filipino born fighter scored his 8th straight victory as he stopped Jose Saez (22-16-6, 12) in the 3rd round. This was a really good result for Asis who appears to becoming a bit of a Cinderella man.

In the US things were much better with China's IK Yang (13-0-0-1, 9) blasting out Roger Rosa (5-3-1) in just 128 seconds. Yang may have missed out on TV time on ESPN but again impressed those in attendance. It really can only be a matter of time before he is being given some real exposure.