|
In 2013 Hiroki Shiino was the OPBF Bantamweight champion and was a touted puncher set to defend his belt against fellow hard hitting Japanese Bantamweight Ryosuke Iwasa. It seemed that the winner of Iwasa/Shiino fight was heading towards big things whilst the loser would have plenty of time to rebuild. After losing that fight Shiino was expected to bounce back and end 2014 on the verge of another OPBF title fight. In his way was the little known Hideo Sakamoto, a relative unknown on the Japanese domestic scene. We won't ruin the result of this one but this is the type of match up that we again love about the Japanese scene where fighters are made to fight and win, lose or draw there are so few easy bouts out the domestic scene. For those wanting a highlight moment we suggest you pay attention to 10:50. (Video courtesy of gentidori)
0 Comments
We are often big fans of All-Japanese under-card bouts. That's not because they are always well matched but it's because we often end up with enjoyable contests that see fighters showing off their skills whilst also fighting with aggressive intent. Neither fighter comes to lose. That was certainly the case when the then then 2-3 Akihiro Yamanaka took on the then 1-1 Shohei Niwa. Both men were being featured on TV and both wanted to leave a lasting impression on the under-card of a Japanese Flyweight title bout. We can't say they stole the show but they certainly gave fans a very fan friendly contest with a lot of shots, a solid tempo and skills that belie the records of the two fighters involved. For a relatively "meaningless" 4 rounder on an under-card this was really good and no at all similar to what we we expect of under-card bouts in either the US or the UK. One thing we love with these videos is that we can help paint a picture of a fighter over a few fighters. For some fighters, such as Naoya Inoue, it can mean a full career whilst for others it can just be a few fights. One thing that is nice however is where we can have a few successive fights showing someones move towards a title for example. That's exactly what we have for Tetsuma Hayashi right now after we stumbled on his fight with Yasuhiro Sakurai, a fight that fell between Hayashi's blow out win over Somsak Singmanasak in June 2011 and his failed Japanese title bout with Takuya Kogawa in April 2012 We won't give away the result from this one but we will say it fits in very nicely in our library and for that we're very happy to have stumbled on it recently. Sometimes you have to feel sorry for some fighters for various reasons. One such fighter is Akifumi Shimoda who has a knack of getting stopped in the most amazing fashion imaginable. The first of Shimoda's KO of the year style defeats came when he lost the WBA Super Bantamweight world title to the criminally frustrating American Rico Ramos. The bout, for the most part, saw Shimoda in charge against a very lazy Ramos, sadly though when Ramos struck, he struck hard and poor Shimoda didn't appear to know what had hit him. It was spectacular to say the least! In 2013 we saw one man come from relatively nowhere to become one of the most must watch Super Flyweights on the planet, and he did it in way that nothing short of amazing as he didn't just beat a world champion in his perceived prime but destroyed him and forced him into retirement. That man was Srisaket Sor Rungvisai who thoroughly beat up Japan's Yota Sato, himself an accomplished and talented fighter who had actually won the belt by beating Srisaket's friend and stablemate Suriyan Sor Rungvisai. Srisaket came in to the bout as a real unknown outside of the Thai scene though ended the bout as a man we, and we assume many others, were dying to see again. Strangely we got to see him a lot in the following months, in fact he won 4 bouts in the following 6 months including a title defense against Hirofumi Mukai. It's not been the best of years for Japan's Tetsuya Hisada who began the year by fighting to a draw with Junichi Ebisuoka and then followed it up with another draw, one with Takahiro Murai. The bout, like the Ebisuoka one, was entertaining with both men believing they could take home the win and although the quality of the action wasn't the best the actual action it's self made up for it in a very fun to watch, and highly competitive, 8 rounder that showed the will to win can make for a much better fight than amazing skills. When a fighter has 17 losses from 45 fights you don't tend to think he's very good, in the case of Junichi Ebisuoka however his record is criminally misleading and he had come close to winning a Japanese national title and has actually fought in a world title fight and OPBF title fight. He is the sort of guy who will give anyone below OPBF level a real nightmare and at Japanese domestic level he really can hold his own. Earlier this year Ebisuoka proved he could hold his own as he fought to a draw with Tetsuya Hisada, a fringe contender on the Japanese domestic scene. The result may not have been a great one for either man but the fight certainly was a good one with both men trying to win and both giving their all in a very entertaining and well cought encounter. (Note this is the second bout between the two men, the first took pace way back in 2008 with Hisada winning a very narrow split decision) In a long and hard career Yuki Murai has proven one thing, he is as tough as old boots. In his 44 bouts he has only been stopped once, by a howitzer from Ryosuke Iwasa that connected as clean as whistle. Murai proved his toughness last year when he became just the second man to hear the final bell against Mexican banger Rey Vargas prior to this fight no one had lasted more than 5 rounds with Vargas, a seriously big puncher and no one had gone into a bout with Vargas with the intent of winning. Murai may not have managed to take home the win but did show that Vargas's dynamite couldn't take everyone out and since this fight he has been taken the distance once before. Although Murai knew he hadn't won but he did his all to give give Vargas a test and that's exactly what he did in a very good performance that showed he has more than just bravery and toughness. Mexico's Dante Jardon probably doesn't like Japanese fighters very much. In his most notable bout to date he was stopped by WBC champion Takashi Miura, prior to that he had been upset by Kyohei Tamakoshi. Between those two bouts Jardon did actually pick up a win against a Japanese fighter, Akinori Kanai. For Kanai it was simply a case of coming up against a fighter who could take his power and fire back though he still gave a decent account of himself and wasn't totally over-whelmed by the interesting and exciting Mexican. The Japanese domestic bouts are often better fights than we get in the UK or the US scene. That doesn't mean they are always more talented or more well schooled but it does tend to mean they are more competitive, more exciting and overall more entertaining to watch. One such bout was the recent contest between Shota Kawaguchi and Kosuke Isono, a bout that ended in spectacular fashion after having been action packed through out with two men who didn't fear the other and wanted to put on a show for the fans. We won't pretend that the skill level here is high but we cannot fault the heart and style of the men involved nor can we ignore what a great finish this bout has. (Video courtesy of Nov K) |
VideosHere we include some of the best, most interesting, most exciting or most eye catching videos from around the Asian boxing world. Archives
May 2024
|