## KITAJIMA AND YANAGIDA MAKE SUCCESSFUL COMEBACKS

July 20, 2000
FUKUOKA, JAPAN?Local favorites of Fukuoka Teiken Gym both suffered bitter defeats in their quests for the national titles in Tokyo last year. But both decked fine victories to show their fine returns to the ring warfare.

Stylish Momotaro Kitajima, 125 1/2, Japanfs #10 ranked contender, pulverized Filipino Tony Bernales, 125, in agony with a wicked body shots at 1:10 of the second round in the first ten. Kitajima, who was stopped by the then Japanese 122-pound champ Yutaka Manabe in the previous year, improved his mark to 16-2, 10 KOs.

Panther Yanagida, 127 1/2, bettered his ledger to 15-3, 13 KOs, as he sent Filipino Joebar Damosmog, 126 1/4, sprawling to the deck twice en route to a fine KO victory at 2:30 of the second round in a scheduled ten.

Yanagida, who boasts of a 6-round decision over now world-rated Kozo Ishii in a local final of Shinjin-o (Novice King) tournaments in 1996, failed to win the Japanese national super-feather title on a 7th-round TKO by Koji Arisawa in July 1999, when he sustained a fractured jaw. It took almost a year prior to this comeback triumph.

Promoter: Yasuo Misumifs Fukuoka Teiken Promotions.

(7-20-00)

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