June 17, 2006
TOKYO, JAPAN
Game and aggressive Daisuke Yamanaka (19-2, 14 KOs), 121.25, captured the Japanese national 122-pound belt as he floored WBA#9/WBC#13 ranked defending champ Rikiya Fukuhara (18-2-1, 14 KOs), 122, twice and battered him to the punch en route to an upset stoppage after the ninth round on Saturday in Tokyo, Japan.
The prefight favorite Fukuhara, making his second defense after dethroning world-rated Shoji Kimura last year, turned out to have suffered a right hand fracture during a hot exchange of punches in the first round, when the challenger caught the champ with a good left hook to drop him on the deck. Fukuhara, one of the most handsome ringmen here who is very popular among gal fans, changed his strategy and began to stick and move with his available left hand, but Yamanaka also shifted his target to the midsection of the footworker, which paid off well. The champ hit the deck again with Yamanaka’s left-right combo in the fifth, when he almost finished the affair with a fusillade of follow-up punches upstairs and downstairs.
The crowd wondered why the champ hadn’t used his right hand without knowing his painful hand injury, despite which Fukuhara fought gamely by using only left jabs, hooks and uppercuts. Sensing his victory coming close, Yamanaka, managed by ex-WBA 108-pound champ Yoko Gushiken, turned more and more aggressive to have the fading champ at bay. It was a disappointing but eventually wise decision that his corner declared the champ’s surrender on the stool because of his right hand pain after the ninth. Before the stoppage, the tallies had been as follows: 89-81 twice and 87-82, all for the lanky challenger.
WBC#5/WBA#6 flyweight Trash Nakanuma (27-6, 12 KOs), 112.5, decked OPBF #2 ranked Filipino champ Jojo Bardon (19-9-2, 9 KOs), 112.75, with a vicious left hook to the belly in the second, but had a tough time coping with his desperate retaliation and managed to earn a unanimous decision (96-95, 97-94 and 98-94) over ten.
It was really a good fight, as both displayed gameness and skills for an entire contest. Nakanuma, who had failed to win the world belt from Pongsaklek Kratindaeng-gym and Lorenzo Parra, almost brought home the bacon in the second, when Bardon was down in agony. The game Filipino, however, came back hard from the third, and it became a give-and-take affair. Bardon turned hot and hit his opponent a moment after the fifth was over, and the ref Vinny Martin penalized a point from the Filipino. Despite Nakanuma’s huge lead on points in the first half, it finally became close on the scorecards because of Bardon’s admirable retaliation in the second half. Nakanuma often attempted to finish him with another big body shots, but Bardon withstood his attack and fought back well with solid right uppercuts that bounced off the face effectively.
Without Bardon losing three points by a knockdown in the second and a penalty in the fifth, it would have been a split draw. We, in Japan, have seen considerably many overmatched visitors against our home-towners, but Bardon, apart from them, showed such good performance that he won the praise of the audience.
Promoter: Watanabe Promotions.
Matchmaker: Joe Koizumi (as for the Nakanuma-Bardon bout).
(6-17-06)