Ancajas Stops Kinoshita With Body Shot in 7th Round in Brisbane

By Keith Idec

Jerwin Ancajas did Manny Pacquiao proud prior to Pacquiao’s fight against Jeff Horn on Sunday afternoon in Brisbane, Australia.

The Filipino southpaw, who is promoted by Pacquiao, stopped Japan’s Teiru Kinoshita with a perfectly placed body shot in the seventh round to retain his IBF world super flyweight at Suncorp Stadium. The 25-year-old Ancajas improved to 27-1-1 and produced his 18th knockout on the Pacquiao-Horn undercard.

The 31-year-old Kinoshita (25-2-1, 8 KOs) lost his second 115-pound world title fight in as many tries. ESPN televised Ancajas’ victory as part of a four-fight telecast that aired Saturday night in the United States and featured Pacquiao’s WBO welterweight title defense against Brisbane’s Horn.

Ancajas drilled Kinoshita with a right hand to the body, which sent Kinoshita to his knees with 1:23 to go in the seventh round. Kinoshita got up before referee Ignatius Missailidis counted to 10, but Missailidis determined that Kinoshita’s badly swollen right eye was too prohibitive for him to continue.

Missailidis stopped the fight at 1:53 of the seventh round.

The swelling surrounding Kinoshita’s right eye began to affect his vision in the sixth round. Ancajas continued to find a home for his left hand in that round.

Kinoshita landed several strong body shots in the fifth round, his best three minutes of the fight to that point.

Ancajas’ advantages in speed and athleticism served him well during the first four rounds, when he repeatedly landed his straight left hand and mostly moved out of Kinoshita’s punching range before his challenger could fire back.

Missailidis ruled that an Ancajas punch opened a cut over Kinoshita’s right eye during the second round, though there was an accidental clash of heads around the time Kinoshita began bleeding. Missailidis stopped the action briefly in the second round to allow a ringside physician to examine Kinoshita’s cut, but the action resumed a short time later.

Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.