Yaegashi defends in messy decision; Yamanaka scores a quick KO; Hasegawa scores a chiller; Yuba claims title #5

The days major action in the boxing world featured solely on action in Japan as NTV showed a world title double header.

The first of the two televised world title fights saw Japanese action fighter Akira Yaegashi (18-3, 9) successfully retaining his WBC and Ring Magazine Flyweight titles with a decision over Mexican challenger Oscar Blanquet (32-6-1, 23). The bout, arguably one of the least exciting in the career of Yaegashi, was messy throughout with Blanquet doing more to spoil the contest than to actually fight. Thankfully the negative tactics of Blanquet weren't rewarded as he lost a decision.

The second of the two world title fights was the more eye catching as WBC Bantamweight champion Shinsuke Yamanaka (19-0-2, 14) blasted out the ill-matched Jose Nieves (22-3-3, 11). Yamanaka was throwing with bad intentions from the off and dropped Nieves late in the opening round. The Puerto Rican challenger stayed down for the count rather than take any more punishment from Yamanaka who looked determined to make a real statement to fellow world champions Tomoki and Koki Kameda.

Prior to the two world title bouts former world champion Hozumi Hasegawa (33-4, 15) scored a chilling KO against the over-matched Mexican Genaro Camargo (42-16, 34). This was with out a doubt the best performance Hasegawa has had in recent bouts and his comeback appears to be well under-way, especially with victories as eye catching and chilling as this one. Hopefully however he's targeting a title fight at Super Bantamweight and not Featherweight as the 126lb division is probably a step too far for the wonderfully talented fighter.

On the untelevised portion of the card Yuichi Kitagawa (1-1) managed to score his first win, taking a decision over Masayoshi Abe (1-1, 1), Masafumi Ando (2-2, 2) stopped Daiki Mori (0-5) and debutant Yo Takekawa (1-0, 1) stopped Susumu Nakata (1-4-2, 1).

It wasn't just the WBC world title double header taking place in Japan however as there was a second card, also held in Tokyo.

On the "other" card, held at the Korakuen Hall, Tadashi Yuba (44-8-2, 32) created history by becoming the first ever 5-weight Japanese national champion. Yuba picked up his 5th divisional title by stopping Yosuke Kirima (17-4-2, 12) in just 156 seconds to claim the Japanese Light Middleweight title.

It wasn't just Yuba in action of course and the undercard featured 5 other bouts. The most notable of which saw veteran Shoji Kawase (31-5-5, 18) out pointing Kazumasa Kobayashi (8-3-1, 5) over the 8 round distance.

The Kawase/Kobayashi bout was one of 3 bouts scheduled for 8 rounds and the only one that went the way we expected. The first of the other 8 round bouts saw Shoma Fukumoto (2-1, 2) unexpectedly stopped by Filipino journeyman     Arnel Tinampay (21-15-1, 7) in the 6th round, the other saw the Hiroya Yamamoto (7-1, 3) suffer his first loss at the hands of Hayato Yamaguchi (10-4-1, 1) who scored his first stoppage.

The show's opening contest saw Ibuki Kitade (1-0) narrowly over-come fellow debutant Fumihiro Ijima (0-1) in a close split decision. This was followed by the show's other preliminary bout which saw Hiroaki Teshigawara (7-1-1, 4) stopping Kyosuke Sawada (0-2) in the second round.

As well as the bouts in Japan there was also a small show held in Thailand that featured three professional boxing contests.

The bouts in Thailand, featured three female contests, saw Chabaprai Kiatsanram (1-0) make a successful debut over coming the much more experienced Ploynapa Sakrungrueng (9-4-1), a former world title challenger. The other bout saw Petchpaya Mor Krungthepthonburi (1-0) also get off to a winning start in her career taking a decision over Yokhow Sor Lertchai (1-1), a fighter who was returning to the ring for the first time in 3 years according to boxrec.com

The other contest, a result that we got late, saw Anrey Sor Saenkamrang (4-1-1, 1) out pointing Kazumi Izaki (8-8-3, 4).