By Ronnie Nathanielsz
The continuing spectacle of terribly overmatched Filipino boxers getting mauled in Thailabd continues with the Games and Amusements Board doing nothing to stop the travesty.
The latest example was the WBC Asian Boxing Council super flyweight title fight held at the Raulway Station Arena in Saraburi, Thailand between former world flyweight champion Medgoen Singsurat (Medgoen 3K Battery) and Filipino Tata Polinar. Ironically, Medgoen ran over Polinar, scoring a knockout at 1:27 of round five. A report from Bangkok said Medgoen “destroyed” Polinar after weakening him with vicious body shots and then putting him away with a left hook.
Medgoen, the same fighter who knocked out Manny Pacquiao in 1999 had an impressive record of 40-3 with 27 knockouts. He fought twice this year scoring a sixth round KO over Lee Escobido on January 14 and a sixth round TKO over Dragon Zheng on March 25. Available records on the boxrec website indicated that Polinar lost by a first round knockout to another Thai. Wanmeechok Singwancha on May 5 last year and reportedly had a record of 2 wins as against 9 defeats.
WBC representative and Bangkok Post columnist Edward Thangarajah reported that Polinar failed to make the weight “after being in the sauna, skipping and running around” for some two hours and was still one pound over the limit forfeiting a percentage of his purse. There was a completely different situation when Christian Maas, another Filipino, battled undefeated WBC Youth flyweight champion Fahpetchnoi Sor Chitpattana who had won four of his last five fights by KO or TKO and compiled a record of 17-0 with 10 KO’s.
Maas weighed a mere 108 ½ pounds which was three-and-a-half pounds below the limit and according to Thangarajah the Filipino boxer claimed he had trained hard and kept his weight down. For all his efforts, Maas was knocked out at 2:33 of the very first round with a single shot to the midsection.
