MASAM SPORTS 45: JERWIN ANCAJAS LOSSES IBF TITLE TO FERNANDO DANIEL MARTINEZ WHILE VINCENT ASTROLABIO WINS OVER GUILLERMO RIGONDEAUX
By Maloney L. Samaco
PhilBoxing.com
Sun, 27 Feb 2022
Jerwin Ancajas ended one of boxing's longest reign when Fernando Martinez pulled off an upset at The Chelsea at The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas, in Las Vegas, Nevada, grabbing the IBF junior bantamweight title by a dominant unanimous decision.
At the opening round, Martinez displayed guts hitting left hooks to the head and body of Ancajas. In the second stanza, Ancajas found his rhythm but Martinez threw and connected more punches.
As the fight progressed, Ancajas just can't cope up with the barrage of power punches thrown by Martinez which landed mostly on his head. Martinez had outlanded Ancajas in power punches in every round, sometimes doubling Ancajas’ blows in the middle rounds.
Martinez unleashed an incredible 1,046 punches, connecting 427 for 41%, a huge lead over Ancajas’ punches which were 192 out of 816 for 24%. The discrepancy in power shots was simply overwhelming as Martinez bombarded Ancajas with 421 of 833 for 51% compared to Ancajas’ 170 of 548 for 31%.
“I want to unify titles and fight the best,” Martinez said. “I fought a warrior tonight, and I made the seemingly impossible, possible.”
Judge Max DeLuca scored it 117-111, Judge David Sutherland saw it 118-110 and Judge Steve Weisfeld had it 118-110 all for Martinez. Displaying superb sportsmanship, Ancajas was the first to congratulate the new champion.
“I am so thankful for Team Martinez for making this fight,” Ancajas said as quoted by RingTV. “Yes, I’ll do a rematch and do everything next time to achieve my goals. I learned a lot in the fight and he was a great challenger.
Ancajas promised his fans and countrymen to rebound from the loss. Though he was happy to give them a good fight.
“It was not my best night, but I’ll be back. Martinez was a very tough opponent and I give him credit for performing well tonight. I’m glad that we could give the fans a great fight with a lot of action.”
Ancajas dropped to 33-2-2 (22 KOs) as Martinez improved to 14-0-0 (8 KOs).
Meanwhile, Vincent Astrolabio dealt Guillermo Rigondeaux his second straight loss by winning a close but unanimous decision at The Lawn of the Emirates Golf Club in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. All three judges scored the fight at 95-94 in favor of Astrolabio.
A knockdown scored by Astrolabio on Rigondeaux in the eighth round was the deciding factor of the slim margin of his triumph. Rigondeaux was a former WBA and WBO super bantamweight champion and moved down to bantamweight in 2020 and now suffered his second straight defeat.
Astrolabio improved his record to 17-3, 12 KOs while Rigondeaux dropped to 20-3, 13 KOs. In all of ten rounds, Astrolabio exploited Rigondeaux's age disadvantage connecting straight right hands on the evasive Cuban former Olympian.
Rigondeaux, however showed his talent and experience to thwart and counter the 24-year-old Filipino slugger, and targeted him with stinging left hands.
Astrolabio caught the sleek Rigondeaux by cutting off the ring landing several punches on the grizzled Cuban.
Astrolabio hit the most important punch midway in the eighth round, when he unleashed a right uppercut that was very timely with Rigondeaux’s motion and sent him crashing to the canvas.
It was the first time Rigondeaux was knocked down since his fight with Japanese Hisashi Amagasa on December 31, 2014 in Osaka, Japan. Rigondeaux was down twice in the seventh round but claimed one of them was a slip or push.
The win is the fifth straight for Astrolabio, as he bounced back from three defeats, including a knockout to Yuki Strong Kobayashi on the Manny Pacquiao-Lucas Matthysse undercard.
Click here to view a list of other articles written by Maloney L. Samaco.
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