MANILA – Filipino boxer Marlon Tapales suffered a 10th round stoppage defeat to Japanese fighter Naoya Inoue in their world super bantamweight unification bout on Tuesday night at the Ariake Arena in Tokyo, Japan.
With the outcome, Inoue has gained Tapales’ International Boxing Federation (IBF) and World Boxing Association (WBA) super bantamweight belts and unified it with his World Boxing Council (WBC) and World Boxing Organization (WBO) belts.
Both fighters were tentative in the first three rounds, unloading limited punches, with Inoue having the most impact to gain the early lead from the judges.
Inoue heightened his aggression in the fourth round as he went toe to toe with Tapales until he found a hole on the Filipino’s defense to unload a left uppercut coupled with a flurry of punches and knocked him down.
Tapales survived the knockdown and still fought with Inoue in the succeeding rounds, but the Filipino could not connect with his punches due to the speed of his Japanese foe.
Tapales, however, could only take so much punishment from Inoue as the Japanese cracked the Filipino fighter with a smashing overhand right to the head, sending him down for good.
With the victory, Inoue maintained his unblemished record of 26-0-0, while also registering his 23rd knockout victory, while Tapales saw his record dropped to 37-4 with 19 KOs.
In the undercard bout, Filipino John Paul Cabunilas sustained a fifth round stoppage defeat to Japanese boxer Kanamu Sakama in a match that was controversially stopped by the referee Koji Tanaka.
Sakama landed a right overhand followed with a combination of punches on Cabunilas, while the Filipino was also having his attacks when suddenly Tanaka jumped in between the two boxers, embracing the Filipino fighter, prompting the stoppage of the fight.
According to Cabunillas’ assistant coach Roger Justine Potot they are mulling to file a formal complaint to the Japan Boxing Commission (JBC) through the Games and Amusements Board (GAB) for Tanaka’s strange stopping of the match./PN
