Vijender Singh's fairytale run in professional boxing continued, with the Indian beating his Tanzanian opponent Francis Cheka via technical knockout, to successfully retain his WBO Asia-Pacific Super Middleweight title here on Saturday.
Unlike Kerry Hope, who pushed Vijender till the 10th round, before losing the title fight in July, Chekka could not even complete three rounds in front of a packed Thyagraj Stadium.
With celebrated names like boxer Mary Kom, wrestlers Sushil Kumar and Yogeshwar Dutt to Minister of State for Home Affairs Kirren Rijiju and yoga guru Baba Ramdev in attendance, Singh defended the crown he bagged at the same venue few months back to win all his eight professional fights.
"Cheka talked so much but I believed in my punch power, and I have done it," Vijender said after the bout.
The boxer from Haryana, who entered the ring with his trademark tune of 'Singh is King', started cautiously as Cheka seemed to be a bit more aggressive with his initial approach.
However, the Indian got into the groove soon enough and made full use of his long reach.
While Cheka struggled to keep his balance, Vijender, who won seven of his eight bouts via knockout, put his long arms to good use.
The second round started in a similar fashion with Vijender being cautious at the beginning. But, once the Indian got a measure of his opponent, he started to deliver clean blows to Cheka's head.
He delivered double blows soon with a left hook and a right jab to take control of the contest. Singh certainly finished the stronger among the two at the end of the round.
In the third round though Vijender stared in front foot and looked to be the one with more intent. The Haryana boxer completely dominated the round as the referees had to stop the fight and eventually ruled the bout in Vijender's favour by a technical knockout.
Earlier, the evening started with a 61kg contest between Rajesh Kumar and Uganda's Mubakaraka Sseguya. In a four-round contest, it was hard to pick between the two counter-attacking boxers and it reflected in the judges' decision, who awarded the bout to the Indian in a split decision of 39-37, 37-38, 39-37.
Next up was Deepak Tanwar (67kg) against Indonesia's Sutriyono Bara Boys. The bout seemed grossly mismatched and Deepak looked way more than a handful for his rival. Deepak, undefeated in the circuit so far, was hardly tested before forced an early end to the proceedings.
It took him one and half a round to pummel his rival, forcing the referee to stop the bout and award a Technical Knockout to Deepak, who stretched his unbeaten streak to four with this win.
Dharmendra Grewal (95kg), six fights old in the circuit, was up against Abasi Kyobe, another Ugandan. The crowd was up on its feet on every punch scored but that did little to hide the sheer sluggishness of the bout. It went the whole hog of four rounds though and Dharmendra was the judges' unanimous choice for the winner.
In a lightweight face-off between Kuldeep Dhanda and Indonesia's Egy Rozten, it was once again the crowd favourite, who emerged victorious, the gulf in quality quite apparent.
This was Kuldeep's third successive triumph in the circuit, keeping his unbeaten record intact.
The last bout before the main event was between Pardeep Kharkera (67kg) and Australian Scott Edward. The six-rounder turned into a battle of attrition as both the boxers seemed exhausted by the second round itself.
Fighting with shell guards, the two tumbled over twice in the course of the bout trying to dodge each other. By the fifth round, the Australian looked exceptionally exhausted and was brought down twice by Pradeep. The Australian had done just enough for the judges to rule unanimously in his favour.
However, Edward did not seem happy after the victory and was seen having a verbal altercation with Pradeep at the end of the bout.