By Ronnie Nathanielsz
Filipino southpaw Vinvin Rufino has lost in his quest for the vacant Oriental and Pacific Boxing Federation featherweight title against Japan’s Naoki Matsuda who is ranked No. 13 by the WBC in Tokyo.
In what was an exciting and entertaining bout the 33 year old Matsuda (32-8-4, 13 KO’s) rose from a third round knockdown fought back ferociously to drop Rufino (28-11-3, 13 KO’s) once in the fourth round and twice more in the fifth to win what boxing writer and Hall-of-Famer Joe Koizumi described as “a hard-fought split decision.”
Two judges scored it for the Japanese by margins of 114-111 and 114-112 while the third judge had Rufino the winner 114-111.
Koizumi reported that Matsuda who earned his WBC rankings following his upset win over Rudy Lopez in Mexico in 2007 “had a really tough time against the game, hard-hitting but fragile Filipino southpaw.” After the third round knockdown courtesy of a devastating left by Rufino it didn’t seem that Matsuda would recover especially since he also suffered a gash over the right eyebrow but he fought back with a vengeance to deck Rufino three times in the next two rounds.
The Filipino had his turn to claw back to take the sixth and ninth rounds and tried desperately to win the title in the last two rounds but Koizumi said the bloodied Matsuda gallantly fought back to earn the victory and the coveted OPBF crown.
