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Philippines, 19 Feb 2026 |
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Araneta Loses on Points in Odd Judging Setup; Still no Japanese World Welterweight Champion By Teodoro Medina Reynoso PhilBoxing.com Fri, 20 Jun 2025  Christian Araneta went down in defeat to long time Japan based Thai fighter Thanomsak Simsri failing in his bid for the vacant IBF world light flyweight championship in Ota City, Japan Thursday. It was a huge letdown for Araneta who waited two years for the title opportunity despite having been the mandatory challenger for almost that long. Despite scoring the fight's only knockdown in the third round, Araneta lost by split decision to Simsri, with two Japanese judges giving their cards to the Thai while the third judge, a Pole, casting the dissenting vote in favor of the Filipino. It was a strange judging set up given the two Japanese judges. It opens questions and suspicions as Simsri, despite being a Thai, can already be considered as a Japan-adopted fighter as Roman Gonzalez and Jorge Linares were before him. It was also in drastic departure of the practice in world title bouts in Japan where they employed an all neutral panel of judges as seen previously. Had the organisers adopted the setup of one judge each from the Philippines and Thailand with the Pole as the neutral judge, the split decision verdict could have gone to Araneta. Even Joe Koizumi, the veteran Japanese correspondent for fightnews.com who first reported on the result, was unconvinced of Simsri's victory, noting that the Thai had barely acquired the title vacated by Masamishi Yabuki who is now WBA flyweight titlist. The strange judging set-up came after Japanese fighters failed to win titles in previous world title bouts held in Japan, including those of the Shigeoka brothers, Kazuto Ioka and Tomoki Kameda. It's intriguing as in the main event with American Brian Norman, Jr. defending his WBO welterweight title against top rated Japanese challenger Jin Sasaki featured an all neutral panel of judges. The judges did not matter as Norman delivered a concussive fifth round knockout win over Sasaki, rendering Japan still without a world welterweight titlist since adopting pro boxing in the 1950s (The Philippines has one in Manny Pacquiao who could win another reign at advanced age in July). Could it be that the organizers adopted the strange judging set-up in the Araneta-Simsri fight to give the home fighter (Simsri) the advantage and end the streak of loses to visiting fighters since months ago? Certainly that losing trend has not been in keeping with Japan being on "a golden age in boxing" as Naoya Inoue loves to say. The author Teodoro Medina Reynoso is a veteran boxing radio talk show host living in the Philippines. He can be reached at teddyreynoso@yahoo.com and by phone 09215309477. Click here to view a list of other articles written by Teodoro Medina Reynoso.  |
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