MANILA – Retirement has not yet crossed the mind of Negrense boxer Donnie Nietes despite suffering a one-sided unanimous decision loss to WBO super flyweight champion Kazuto Ioka earlier this month.
According to the Murcia, Negros Occidental fighter, he will shake off the effects of his second boxing career defeat, the first in 18 years, before trying to vie for a world title anew.
“I was defeated but, without question, I can still fight for word titles,” the former four-division world boxing champion said. “There’s still plenty left in my tank and I will work my way back into title contention as soon as possible.”
He added: “There is no doubt in my mind that I can challenge once again, and I see myself probably having one or two more fights at world level before I hang up my gloves.”
Nietes was trying to reclaim the WBO world junior bantamweight title in Japan from Ioka but was defeated on the scorecards, with all three ringside judges awarding the fight to hometown fighter.
Ioka was given the win with scores of 120-108, 118-110 and 117-111 after 12 rounds at the Ota-City Gymnasium, in what was a rematch of 2018’s clash between the pair, which was won by Nietes.
Nietes said that, while he had no complaints about the result but was frustrated that Ioka, who had promised to be ‘aggressive’, was not prepared to stand and trade punches more often.
“I lost the fight on points, and I felt that Ioka did not want to try and deliver a knockout win for his fans and was just happy to win the fight on the scorecards,” the Negrense boxer said.
“I was not able to put as much pressure on Ioka as I would have liked. I was waiting for Ioka to move in and throw his shots, so that I could hit him with my big counters, but it didn’t happen often enough,” he added.
Nietes, who is being managed by Probellum promotions, currently has a 43-2-6 win-loss-draw ring record, including 23 stoppage wins. The match against Ioka was his third since returning from a three-year hiatus in 2021./PN
