On a great double header card in Tokyo today, two World title belts were at stake.
In the first bout, Poonsawat Kratingdaenggym 40-1 (28) from Thailand made a first successful defence of the WBA super bantamweight crown he won when knocking out Bernard Dunne back in September. Today his opponent was unbeaten Japanese fighter Satoshi Hosono 16-1 (12).
The bout was a good one with lots of action, mostly taking part at close quarters. Hosono entered the ring with a 7 inch advantage in height but threw it away by fighting out of a crouch. Big shots were exchanged thoughout the bout and the referee was a virtual spectator. Poonsawat landed solid hooks and body shots to Hosono.
Hosono fought gamely but was just outworked at crucial times. Hosono though showed just how tough he was and seemed to win the final two rounds. The judges though got the scoring about right and scored for Poonsawat by scores of 117-113, 115-113 and the third judge had it 114-114 to give the Thai a majority decision. After the bout Kratingdaenggym who certainly is not afraid to travel called out long time WBC bantamweight champion and Japanese star Hozumi Hasegawa.
Japan did have a winner on the night when Takashi Uchiyama 14-0 (11) took the WBA super featherweight crown from Mexican Juan Carlos Salgado 21-1-1 (15) with a final round stoppage.
Salgado shocked the boxing world back in October when winning the title in a shock one round win over Jorge Linares and was out to prove he was deserving of the crown. Today he proved he was, but left the ring an ex champion.
The bout was quite even to start with but Uchiyama would not be denied and started getting to a tiring Salgado down the home straight. Salgado was dropped in the final round and although he struggled back to his feet, the referee stopped the bout with 10 seconds to go.
By JIMMY LAST (EDITOR)
