By Erik Smight: Undefeated EBU (European) light middleweight champion Zaurbek Baysangurov (18-0, 13 KOs) successfully defended his EBU title on Sunday night in his first title defense, stopping Ukrainian Roman Dzuman (23-5-1, 10 KOs) in the 8th round of a scheduled 12-round bout at the Sportpalace Meteor, in Dnipropetrovsk, Ukraine. Baysangurov, 23, a former amateur star from Achhoy-Martan, in Chechnia, Russia, knocked Dzuman, 32, down twice in the bout, and shortly after the second knockdown, the referee halted the bout as Dzuman was sustaining punishment while trapped on the ropes by Baysangurov.
In the 1st round, Baysangurov, who fights in a rather calm, methodical style in which he wastes little energy, mostly jabbed in the first round as Dzuman attacked him ferociously with huge windmill punches. It was hard to imagine how a fighter like Baysangurov could stay so calm during this time, for Dzuman was all over him throwing wide hooks almost nonstop, yet Baysangurov seemed not to be bothered in the least as he blocked many of them, leaning back to try and slip the others. Many, of course, got threw and connected to the head of Baysangurov, but he didn’t seem to care in the least. He merely stayed composed, using his hard jab to finish out the round.
Though Baysangurov was only an inch taller at 5’10 1/2 than Dzuman, he seemed much taller than that because he fights in an upright stance, rarely bending his knees or widening his stance to get leverage on his punches. However, his power comes most from short chopping punches which he seemed to get a lot of torque on, hurting Dzuman often. He also seemed to vary the power in his shots, which seemed to confuse Dzuman as he’d get used to being hit lightly than all of a sudden a punch with enormous power would be thrown by Baysangurov, and Dzuman seemed not ready prepared for.
In the 2nd and 3rd rounds, Dzuman’s work rate enabled him to win both rounds on my scoring as he simply never stopped punching for a second reminding me of a younger Aaron Pryor in some ways. However, his face was beginning to redden for he seemed to be tiring out under his tremendous pace. At the same time, his punches weren’t having any effect on Baysangurov, who took them, blocking many, and not seeming bothered by the ones that got through. He barely seemed to even be breaking a sweat, looking as if he just entered the ring. In contrast, Dzuman looked exhausted from his nonstop pace. Clearly, Dzuman needed to slow his pace because he was putting himself in danger of punching himself out and ultimately being stopped. Baysangurov showed some dirty tricks in the round – holding the back of Dzuman’s head with his left hand while punching him with the other hand – which he would use occasionally during the fight.
Baysangurov began to increase his pace in the 4th round, hitting Dzuman with short chopping right hands, powerful left hooks and sledgehammer jabs. It seemed that every punch that he threw had a lot of power behind it, though not in the class of light middleweight prospect James Kirkland, but still very powerful none the less. Dzuman began to show signs of swelling underneath his right eye, and his nose was bleeding.
Dzuman came out on fire in the 5th round, as he attacked Baysangurov with an unrelenting firestorm of punches. It did little to stop Baysangurov, however, who began throwing even harder punches in return. Dzuman’s all out attack backfired on him when he was hit with a short right hand while attempting to land a punch, causing him to stagger backwards and take a knee. The referee then gave him a standing eight count. Fortunately for Dzuman, there were only a few seconds left in the round and he only had to take a handful of punches from Baysangurov before the round ended. Dzuman’s face was a bloody mess by the time the round ended, as his nose had been bleeding profusely all throughout the round.
In rounds six and seven, Baysangurov dominated the action with his short powerful shots to the head, and his excellent jab which he kept in Dzuman’s face constantly. For his part, Dzuman was still attacking fiercely, and had the Ukrainian crowd cheering every punch he attempted. However, Baysangurov seemed to be not bothered to least by having the crowd against him, and simply began measuring Dzuman with his left hand, throwing pin point rights to his midsection and head. The measured shots were like missiles and clearly bothered Dzuman, who looked hurt every time Baysangurov would throw one.
In the 8th round, Baysangurov battered Dzuman around the ring with left-right combinations. Dzuman still gamely attempted to take the fight to him but it was almost pointless, because he had nothing left at this point that would even remotely bother the machine-like Baysangurov. Near the end of the round, Baysangurov, once again, began measuring Dzuman for right hands, and tagged him with three consecutive rights, hurting him with the second punch and dropping him with the third. Again, Dzuman was given a standing eight count by the referee. As soon as the action resumed, Baysangurov landed a left-right combination followed by a right hook to the midsection, causing the referee to step in and stop the fight to prevent Dzuman from sustaining any more additional punishment.