Golovkin retains title whilst Loreto shocks the boxing world

It's not often that we get fights of note around the world but today was one such case with fights in Japan, the Philippines, Russia and Monaco.

Tokyo, Japan
The earliest action of the day was in Tokyo courtesy of a brilliant domestic card that was headlined by a national Light Flyweight title fight.

The aforementioned Japanese title fight saw Yu Kimura (13-2-1, 2) narrowly defeating Kenichi Horikawa (25-13-1, 4) in a split decision. The bout, Horikawa's 3rd national title fight, was one that could easily have gone either way and sadly for Horikawa it went against him just like his previous 2. Although Horikawa lost we'd love to see him getting one more chance, even if it's in a rematch with Kimura, because of how close he has been, not just in this attempt but in prior bouts to Ryuji Hara and Akira Yaegashi.

In the co-feature the well liked Yasutaka Ishimoto (24-6, 7) made light work of Indonesia's Zun Rindam (9-4-1, 4) stopping him early on. After the bout Ishimoto said he wanted to win titles this year and appeared to mention the OPBF title which is currently held by Shingo Wake which is a bout we'd love to see made as a world title eliminator.


Two of the three 8 rounders on the card went the distance with Masanobu Nakazawa (14-1-1, 5) out pointing Kazumasa Kobayashi (8-4-1, 5) the closest of the two bouts whilst Jun Hamana (9-1, 3) beat Kosuke Saka (8-2, 5) in what was, on paper, a very competitive looking contest. The third however was never going to complete the scheduled as Yuichi Yokoyama (13-2, 12) managed to force a retirement of Koichi Ito (9-2-2, 8) in what was, on paper, the least likely bout of the day to go the scheduled distanced.

In the opening bouts, both 4 rounders, Ryuya Kaji (1-0, 1) scored a debut win stopping Koichi Nagatsuka (3-2, 1) mid-way through round 2 whilst Regent Kusumoto (1-0) fought hard to claim a victory over Takahiro Yoneshige (0-1) in an all debutant contest.


Metro Manilla, Philippines
Whilst we'll admit that the Japanese card, above, and the Monaco card, below, were the two that had our interest there was also a notable card in Metro Manila with several title fights and a number of notable fighters.

The biggest fight on this show saw Dennis Laurente (47-5-5, 28) stopping the over-matched Thai Singdet Nonpitayakom (11-16-1, 8) in a successful defense of the WBC Asian Boxing Council Light Middleweight title. The experienced Laurente sent Singdet down for the count with a devastating body shot.

Laurente was one of two men who retained his title asJuan Martin Elorde (15-1-1, 7), the grand son of Flash Elorde, retained his WBO Asia Pacific super Featherweight title courtesy of a disappointing technical draw with Chaiyong Sithsaithong (32-12-4, 24). The bout was unfortunately ended when Elorde was cut on the temple from a clash of heads.

The Elorde/Chaiyong fight wasn't the only one which ended early due to a clash of heads as Randy Braga (12-0-1, 2) also suffered a cut from a clash of heads as he took on Jonel Alibio (16-17-5, 8). As with the Elorde fight this was ended in the second round.

Braga wasn't the only man keeping his unbeaten record on this show as the talented Giemel Magramo (9-0, 6) scored a 3rd round KO over Rey Morano (8-39-1, 1), Jay Loto (7-0) took a hard fought decision over Dexter Dimaculangan (3-4-5, 1), JK Elorde (3-0, 3) stopped the debuting Juanito Paderes (0-1) and Roderick Flores (2-0-1, 1) narrowly kept his 0 with a draw against the win-less CJ De Tomas (0-1-1).

The other bouts on the show saw Diomel Diocos (2-1-2, 2) fighting to a draw with Fidel Cuyno (1-2-2), Robin Langres (1-0) scoring a debut victory over fellow debutant Raul Luba (0-1) and Wilbert Berondo (1-0) also took an all debutant victory over Jomar Manlangit (0-1).

Chelyabinsk, Russia
As well as the shows in Japan and the Philippines we also had a small one in Russia courtesy of Ural Boxing Promotions. The main contest here sa Murat Gassiev (15-0, 9) out pointing teak tough veteran Ismail Abdoul (51-28-2, 19) to claim the vacant IBF East/West Europe Cruiserweight title. Although Gassiev was taken 12 rounds, for the first time in his career, it's unlikely he expected anythign less with Abdoul being one of the toughest men in boxing.

In a Welterweight contest on this show Konstantin Ponomarev (23-0, 11) managed to over come Ramon de la Cruz Sena (16-10-2, 9), who we believe was a late replacement opponent.

The only other bout on this show saw Heavyweight hopeful Murad Khalidov (10-0, 5) take an easy stoppage over the very limited Sedrak Agagulyan (1-27-1) who had previously been stopped 16 times.

Monte Carlo, Monaco
The biggest show of the day in Monaco as we got the excellent "Monte Carlo Boxing Bonanza" and thankfully for us it included a number of fighters of major interest to ourselves.

In the shows first contest we had a bout of interest to us as Russian born-German based Welterweight Roman Belaev (13-0, 10) defeated the gutsy but out classed Dean Byrne (17-3-1, 6) and claimed the WBA Continental Welterweight title. The fight, the biggest of Belaev's career so far, really saw him shining as he beat up and broke down Byrne.

Whilst it was a good win for Belaev, who was impressive and looked very strong from the opening round to the final round, we will admit that there are faults to be picked with his performance. Firstly Belaev's lack of a jab could have been costly against a better opponent than Byrne, secondly he doesn't really seem willing to throw combinations too much and thirdly his understanding of distance is questionable. With those things said however he does look very promising and very entertaining.

Although Belaev was the more impressive man we do need to give a lot of credit to Byrne who proved to be very tough, very game and the fact he lasted the distance was genuinely shocking considering how many hard shots he took.

The second bout on the show was another one of interest to us as Filipino Rey Loreto (18-13, 10) took on South African Nkosinathi Joyi (24-3-0-1, 17) in a battle for the IBO Light Flyweight title and scored one of the biggest upsets of 2014.

The fight started competitively with Loreto showing not fear of the highly regarded Joyi. It seemed obvious that Loreto knew he belonged at this and wasn't there to be intimidated despite the reputation of Joyi who was once regarded as being on the fringes of the pound-for-pound lists. The confidence of Loreto was obvious again in the second round as he landed a number of solid counter punches, including one that seemed to rock Joyi on the bell.

Knowing he had hurt Joyi in round 2 Loreto jumped on his opponent to start round 3 and within a minute of the round he had dropped Joyi hard with one of the best shots he will ever land. Joyi, with his eyes closed, was out for the count and Loreto deservedly celebrated his second major win in a row having beaten Pornsawan Porpramook last time out

The key thing that needs saying about Loreto's win is "what an upset!"

The third bout on the show was a Cruiserweight contest that saw the very highly ranked Ilunga Makabu (16-1, 15) stopping the previously unbeaten Ruben Angel Mino (20-1, 20) in 2 rounds. It wasn't a bout with an Asian interest per se but it was still an interesting result that was worth mentioning, like wise the same could be said of Jarrod Fletcher's (18-1, 10) victory over Max Bursak (29-2-1, 12).

In the main event we saw Gennady Golovkin (29-0, 26) successfully retain his WBA Middleweight title in an entertaining, though thoroughly one sided, bout with Ghana's tough Osumanu Adama (22-4, 16). Golvokin managed to drop Adama in rounds 1, 6 and 7 before the referee finally waved the bout off as Adama's knees buckled.

It wasn't the most impressive performance from Golovkin but it showed what he was about as he methodically broke down and beat up a game and brave opponent. At the end of the day however it was a mismatch with Adama having nothing to bother the Kazakh destroyer who took the challengers best shots and kept coming forward.

We're hoping that Golovkin gets a fight with a big name in the US in April, the rumour seems to be that he'll be facing James Kirkland next though from our view Daniel Geale would make for a much better contest. Whoever he fights it'll be a major day with the boxing world already in love with the man known as "Triple G".