By Ronnie Nathanielsz

The father/trainer of Nonito “The Filipino Flash” Donaire believes his son’s boxing skills will prevail when he faces undefeated Jamaican Nicholas Walters before a sell-out crowd at the StubHib in Carson City, California on Saturday.

“Dodong” Donaire told BoxingScene.com/Manila Standard/Viva Sports that Nonito, a five division world champion and the reigning WBA featherweight super champion is “a skilled fighter whose moves are back and is in great shape.”

Donaire Sr. revealed that Nonito “trained very hard for the fight with Walters (the regular WBA champion) and “his mind is focused” even as he pointed out that Nonito “went home only once” which was in stark contrast to the past when he would sometimes skip training.

The father/trainer said Nonito “went back to his old style” which proved successful in enabling him to be named “Fighter of the Year” in 2012 and No. 5 in the Ring Magazine’s pound for pound rankings with four smashing victories that same year with two of the fights against Japan’s super champion Toshiaki Nishioka and South Africa’s Jeffrey Mathebula held at the Home Depot Center, now renamed the StubHub.

He said Donaire’s “movement is back and he has a smart way of fighting.”

“Dodong” Donaire said they feel Walters who has an impressive record of 20 knockouts in n24 wins with no defeats will try to go for an early knockout which the Jamaican predicted would be in rounds 5 or 6 or even earlier if Donaire makes a mistake.

But from the looks of it, Nonito is not likely to make many mistakes and they have worked on “a solid game-plan to counter”  the knockout efforts of Walters which was perfected during sparring with featherweight Guy Robb (14-1, 6 KO’s).

“Fighter of the Decade” Manny Pacquiao’s adviser Michael Koncz told the Manila Standard/Viva Sports that the fight against Walters “is a make or break fight for Nonito. I think it’s a big challenge for Donaire and if he is able to overcome the odds in this fight he will earn my respect.”

The fight card will be telecast by the giant broadcast network ABS-CBN on its pre-eminent Channel 2 at 10:15 a.m. on Sunday.