Malcolm Tu?acao defends OPBF Title in Japan
By Rene Bonsubre, Jr.
PhilBoxing.com
Mon, 21 Jun 2010
Oriental and Pacific Boxing Federation (OPBF) Bantamweight champion Malcolm Tu?acao of Mandaue City, Cebu will fight world ranked Japanese Kohei Oba in a twelve round bout at the International Conference Hall in Nagoya, Aichi, Japan this July 11.This will be Tu?acao's first defense of the title he won last February 6 from Seung-Suk Chae of South Korea.
Oba is ranked number 5 by the WBC and number 9 by the WBA. He is undefeated in 28 fights with 11 knockouts and only one draw courtesy of Tu?acao four years ago. They fought to a split 12 round draw in an OPBF bantamweight title bout in the same venue. Oba's last fight was a ten round unanimous decision win over Filipino Eric Barcelona last March.
Tu?acao's title victory against Chae was a razor thin split decision in Mungyeong, South Korea. All three judges scored it 115-114 with judges Wan-Soo Yuh and Hisatoshi Miyazaki going for the Filipino and Jae-Bong Kim going for the Korean.
Malcolm is a former WBC world flyweight champion. Ten years ago, in his 11th pro fight, he beat Medgoen Singsurat of Thailand by 7th round TKO for the world title and had a draw against Celes Kobayashi of Japan in his first defense. He lost his crown to Pongsaklek Wonjongkam of Thailand in 2001 by first round TKO after being dehydrated trying to make the weight.
At 31 years old, Tu?acao (25W(KO 15) -2L - 3D)remains one of our more talented boxers and a victory against Oba could pave the way for another world title shot.
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