SOUTH African bantamweight champion Bukiwe Nonina will probably be remembered more for her empty pre-fight talk and her ignominious defeat by Catherine Phiri who defended her World Boxing Council (WBC) silver female bantamweight title with a second round TKO.
Unlike Bukiwe, Devis Casseres, who perhaps due to language difficulties, wasn’t as vocal before the fight, will equally be remembered for offering the least resistance to WBC International welterweight champion Charles Manyuchi who caused the Colombian not to answer the bell for the third round after a short but merciless beat down from the Zimbabwean.
The outcome of the two bouts has left a sour taste in the mouths of most fans which has sparked a sharp, but highly justified debate about the calibre of the two boxers. The fans were yearning for prolonged and sustained action after parting with tidy sums, but it was not to be.
They argued that if the two were worthy challengers the fights should have been a little more competitive so that, even though there would be a winner and a loser, the losses should be legitimate and respectable. The real poser was why the two fights ended in similar fashion-retirement after round two in each case.
Well, the debate will go on for some time, but in boxing, one punch can change everything regardless of a boxer’s quality. For instance, Mike Tyson destroyed the great classic boxer Michael Spinks in 91 seconds, Antonio Tarver knocked out Roy Jones Jr in two rounds, Marvin Hagler knocked out Thomas “The Hitman” Hearns in three short rounds. All these, were big names in the sport.
Conditioning is extremely important in boxing. If a boxer takes the sport seriously whether amateur or even professional, conditioning is needed, especially when you have to assume your opponent is working twice as hard as you.
Conditioning is the winning factor for many fights. Having that advantage over your opponent is important because he will fade over the rounds and you can lift the pace to where he won’t be adequately keeping up to win the rounds.
Oriental Quarries Boxing Promotions director of operations and his team deserve commendation for organizing a successful tournament this past week. However, there were a number of shortcomings I observed. One boxer had no gloves on when the first fight was about to start and had to be gloved in the ring, which is not the practice.
There was a glitch with the singing of national anthems for Colombia and Zambia. The first anthem for Colombia was a wrong one and the correct one was played after much time was lost. The master of ceremonies had to fill the wait by reading names of sponsors. The taped Zambian national anthem could not be played either, which forced the Emcee to lead the audience in singing the anthem.
The ring announcer needs to improve his act. Announcement of knockouts were confined to the rounds in which the KOs occurred. Professionally, the time a KO happens must be announced along with the round in which it happened.
And then there were a few flaws with the performance of one referee who officiated the Loreta Muzeya-Monalisa Sibanda bout. The referee took long to stop Loreta from punching Monalisa who was on the canvas. The referee should have moved in quickly and warned Loreta not to continue punching her opponent on the canvas.
There were also loud complaints from fans, especially those who travel by public transport, that the fights started too late, which could jeopardize their movement back home after the tournament.
All in all, the tournament was, like the others by OQBP before it, a success despite the shortcomings cited. Comments: mwale.simon@yahoo.co.uk   0966 755574/0953744074