CEBU’S “Golden Boys” kept their respective Oriental and Pacific Boxing Federation (OPBF) titles via separate routes before a sold-out crowd at the Nagoya International Hall in Nagoya, Japan yesterday.
Super-featherweight champion Randy “Kumo’ng Bato” Suico scored a four-round stoppage over Ryuhei Sugita to keep his 130-pound title, while Malcolm Tu?acao had a split draw with Kohei Ohba and still retained his bantamweight title after 12 rounds.
Ironically, it was Cebuano ringside judge Teddy Alivio’s even 115-115 score for Tu?acao’s fight that led to the draw result. Australian judge scored the fight 115-114 for Tu?acao, while the Japanese judge gave the win to Ohba, 115-113.
Tu?acao’s camp was surprised with the verdict, saying the former World Boxing Council flyweight champion won seven of the 12 rounds. The draw, however, was still enough for Tu?acao to retain his 118-pound regional title.
Suico made his sixth titular defense following his technical knockout win at 2:39 of the fourth round.
Jab improved
In his first defense outside Cebu, Suico was all business, tagging the Japanese challenger with powerful hooks and straights, while showing a vastly improved jab.
The win hiked Suico’s record to 24 wins against two losses with 21 KOs, while Sugita dropped to 30-3-2 win-loss-draw with 22 KOs.
Suico’s defeats were handed by South African Mzonke Fana in April 2004 and Mexican Javier Jauregui in September last year.
Both natives of Mandaue City, Tu?acao and Suico were supposed to have boxing superstar Manny Pacquiao at ringside during their fight. However, Pacquiao cancelled his plan to fly to Japan last Friday after suffering from fever after his overnight visit to Cebu last Thursday.
