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The sole female bout this past Friday saw Yunoka Furukawa (1-1-2, 1) and Shoko Hayashida (1-2-1, 1) battling to a very competitive draw over 4 rounds in "The Hall".
Whilst the bout was certainly nothing major, it was was notably the first time Hayashida had made it to the final bell.
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The 26b year old Japanese fighter Tomoko Kawanishi (8-1, 4) made the first defense of her female OPBF Super Flyweight title in lightning quick fashion.
Matched against the unbeaten Tamao Ozawa (5-1, 2) many expected this to be a good bout but Kawanishi managed to see off her challenger in just 111 seconds to retain her title. It's now expected that Kawanishi will look towards world honours, she may need to wait a bit longer but we imagine that a world title fight will only be a fight or two away for the talented young lady.  Courtesy of boxrec.com Ina Menzer (31-1, 11) was, for many years, one of the top female fighters on the planet and widely regarded as one of the truly elite Featherweights. Her career however may now be over.
Menzer was in action earlier today as she took on the Lithuanian born German based Goda Dailydaite (8-1, 2) a fighter who was coming in to the ring with an unbeaten record and youth on her side. Despite the youth advantage of Dailydaite, Menzer showed what experience can do as she controlled the bout from the onset using her skills, her nous and her speed to genuinely dominate her opponent. It was difficult from the off to see how Dailydaite could cope with Menzer and this proved the case to be the case round after round. Menzer took the opening two rounds comfortably before hurting and twice dropping Dailydaite who did well to see out round 3. Unfortunately for the crowd this was as close to a stoppage as we got as Menzer just did as she wished winning round after round without any real challenge from the younger fighter. Come round 9 it was obvious that Dailydaite, a renowned "non-puncher" was going to need a stoppage, something that was never going to happen as Menzer continued to sweep the championship rounds to easily claim the WIBF, WIBA and the WBF "interim" Featherweight titles. Sure they aren't the WBA, WBC, WBO or IBF titles but they all mean something a fighter like Menzer who wants to win titles. Although Menzer looked in scintillating form it appears that she made a very clear suggestion that this would be her final bout, being quoted in the German press as saying "Das war mein letzter Kampf" ("That was my last fight") though some suspect that if a promoter offers her some backing she will return to the ring. If she doesn't return this was a fitting send off to one of the most popular female boxers in German boxing history, despite the fact she was born in Kazakhstan.  Courtesy of boxrec.com Russian blonde bombshell Svetlana Kulakova (8-0, 1) proved there was a lot more to her than a body to die for as she claimed the interim WBA female Light Welterweight title with a commanding victory over Judy Waguthii (12-6-3, 3).
The Russian, fighting for her first real world title set the pace from the off with a busy offensive style that forced the Kenyan into a defensive shell. With Kulkakova's offensive style it really gave the Kenyan very few chances to launch attacks, she seems to be bombarded from every direction by a torrent of punches from a fighting wanting to prove a point. To make things worse for the Kenyan, every assault of the Russian drew cheers from the crowd who seemed grow in confidence every time the crowd cheered. It was difficult to give Waguthii any of the first 9 rounds, she may have claimed one but then again there was no guarantee she even managed that. Despite being in a huge hole Waguthii did manage to show some fight in the final round cutting the Russian late in the fight with a hard, solid punch. Fortunately for Kulkakova she managed to see out the trouble and was the clear winner in the eyes of the judges taking a unanimous decision. Although the cards weren't read out it was a very comfortable decision. Although Kulkakova claimed the interim title it's very, very unlikely that she will be fighting for the regular title, held by the very good Argentinian Monica Silvina Acosta. The fight is winnable for Kulkakova but she'd likely have to travel to Argentina for the bout and this would be very unlikely given Kulkakova's win here.  Courtesy of http://www.koreaboxing.co.kr Not every female title bout is memorable but this past weekend's WBO female Minimumweight title fight between unbeaten Korean Su-Yun Hong (9-0, 5) and Japanese challenger Mari Ando (10-6, 5) was one of the ones that really was special.
Hong, a talented boxer-puncher, got off to an excellent start racking up the early rounds with her sharp punching and fantastic movement. It appeared at times too easy for the Korean who just seemed to much more skilled than Ando. The Japanese challenger, herself a former WBA Atomweight champion, seemed to know that she had to change something and through the middle rounds she began to fight back. Although she still seemed to be losing rounds she was beginning to make them competitive and starting to tag the champion her own solid shots, shots that would begin to mark up the face of the champion. Although Hong had seemingly taken a clear lead in the early rounds Ando began to crawl her way back into the fight in the latter stages clearly winning 2 of the late rounds as she attempted to take Hong out and take the the title to Japan. Unfortunately for the Japanese fighter Hong had the ability to see out the distance and force the judges to make a decision. Despite many, ourselves included, seeing the bout as a clear victory for Hong, made competitive by Ando's late charge, the judges were split. Korean Judge Kyung-Han Lee favoured the Korean fighter scoring the bout 99-91 Hong, Japanese judge Katsuhiko Nakamura scored the bout as a close contest though favoured Ando 96-94 whilst the deciding judge Bruce McTavish, of the Philippines though originally from New Zealand, favoured Hong by a score of 98-92 to help the Korean to her second title defense. With both of her eyes swollen up Hong will know she was in a fight. The split decision, at least to us, was rather misleading and unrepresentative of the actual bout though we wouldn't imagine Hong would be in a rush to face Ando again. For the Japanese fighter it's fair to say she will be a handful against anyone. She might win another world title fight but she will give fighters hell in each and every major fight she gets. Unbeaten Korean fighter Jong-Sun Park (2-0, 1) managed to remain unbeaten as she took a unanimous decision over domestic rival Ji-Eun Yang (0-1) who was making her debut.
This was Park's second bout of the year after stopping Ji-Yun Ahn in March. It appears Yang may not be all that bad despite her loss here. Over in Japan Nana Yoshikawa (1-0) took a dominant 6 round decision over Thai visitor Pantiwa Kaewmahosod (0-1). The bout was a clear win for the Japanese fighter who would have been very happy at her performance. On the same card as Takashi Miura's excellent WBC Super Featherweight title defence against Sergio Thompson there was also a bout for Filipino American fighter Ana Julaton (12-4-1, 2).
Julaton, a former WBO female Super Bantamweight champion was fighting for the first time in over a year as she took on Celina Salazar (5-1-2, 1). Unfortunately the ring rust and inactivity didn't help Julaton, who had promised "fireworks in Cancun", and she was out pointed by her less experienced American opponent. It wasn't all bad for former world champions however and in Australia former WIBA Minimumweight champion Gretchen Abaniel (13-4, 4) swiftly dispatched Thai opponent Fahpratan Looksaikongdin (7-6) who was stopped inside a round by the talented Filipino. This was Abaniel's third successive victory after a trio of defeats at the world level in 2011-2012.  Courtesy of http://www.koreaboxing.co.kr It's not often we've been able to say this since we started "Asian Boxing" but right now I think we can safely safe that Korean boxing is on a temporary high.
The cause of Korean celebrations right now belongs solely to "Defector Girl Boxer" Hyun-Mi Choi (8-0-1, 2) who successfully claimed the WBA Female "interim" Super Featherweight title earlier today to become a 2-weight world champion. The popular Korean fighter, who was born in Pyongyang before escaping to South Korea, faced Japanese veteran Fujin Raika (25-8-1, 10) a former 3-weight world champion. Although Choi was favoured going in to the bout it was seen as a potentially difficult bout with Raika being tough, experienced and a real battler. Despite this Choi actually made the bout look easy at times. Using her height and reach advantage from the off Choi was able to land clean shots as Raika came in looking to get to where she could land. Through much of the bout this tactic worked well for Choi who appeared quicker, stronger and and more skilled as well as naturally larger. Despite being out pointed Raika did her her successes throughout the bout she was, on the whole, unable to have enough of them in the earlier rounds to win them. She was making some competitive but never really doing enough to clearly claim any of them. Although Raika started to look every bit of her 37 years late in the fight where she was obviously tiring she refused to just lie down and take defeat and really went for the big turn around in the final round, a round in which she caught Choi with some solid shots. Unfortunately for the Japanese fighter however Choi fired back her own shots and never looked in much trouble despite the surge of offensive success from Raika. Having given up her WBA Featherweight title prior to this bout Choi will almost certainly be feeling that she made the right move to go to Super Featherweight rather than drain herself down as she had been in her past few fights. Sadly at the end of the fight Raika looked somewhat like a broken fighter. Despite her great career she'll almost certainly be thinking about hanging them up. At her best she'd probably not have beaten Choi though right now she's a long way from her best. On the same card Hye-Soo Park (3-6-1, 1) scored her first career stoppage taking out young Thai Airada Sithsonram (2-1) in the 5th round of a scheduled 10th as she claimed the female PABA Super Flyweight title and Dan-Bi Kim (8-2-1, 2), a former IBFA Minimumweight champion, out pointed the winless Thai Yokfah Sitkhrusin (0-4). It's not too often a fight debuts again a former world title challenger but that's exactly what Chabaprai Kiatsanram (1-0) did earlier today in Thailand.
Making her debut in Bangkok's royal square Kiatsanram took on Ploynapa Sakrungrueng (9-4-1), a woman who had only previously lost in world title fights to Yeon-Hee Kim and Ju Hee Kim, both in Korea. Despite the gulf in experience going against her the novice showed the class needed to over-come Sakrungrueng. Kiatsanram wasn't the only fighter making her debut on the card and fellow debutant Petchpaya Mor Krungthepthonburi (1-0) also got off to a victorious start as she out pointed Yokhow Sor Lertchai (1-1) who appears to have been fighting for the first time in 3 years. |
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