By Jim Dower: Big 6’7″ German Timo Hoffmann (38-6-1, 22 KOs) will be returning to the ring against former International Boxing Federation (IBF) heavyweight champion Francois Botha (47-4-2, 28 KOs) on May 10th at an undisclosed location in Germany. The South African Botha, now 40-years-old, is making his third fight since returning to boxing after a five year layoff between 2002-2007, and is hoping to become a factor in the heavyweight division.
Since starting his comeback, both had defeated journeyman Bob Mirovic and Ron Guerrero. Botha stopped fighting in 2002 after a 8th round stoppage to Wladimir Klitschko and a 10-round draw to Clifford Etienne.
Hoffmann, 34, never was able to fulfill the early promise of his career after starting out at 22-0. He ran into Vitali Klitschko in 2000, and lost a one-sided 12-round unanimous decision, taking a lot of punishment in the process from Vitali.
From there, Hoffmann split two fights with Michael Sprott, beat the power punching journeyman Ross Puritty, but was again defeated, this time by Henry Akinwande in 2003. Hoffmann would continue fighting only in Germany against most European opponents, fighting to a 10-round draw to Luan Krasniqi in 2004, and then losing to Italian Paolo Vidoz by a 12-round split decision in 2006.
The next year, Hoffmann would lose back to back fights to fringe contender Timor Ibragimov and top ranked Alexander Dimitrenko. Most recently, Hoffmann defeated Raymond Ochieng in a 4th round TKO in October 2008.
In his prime, Botha was a decent fighter, had a nice right hand and an excellent jab. However, at 40, he’s probably asking too much of his self to fight a giant like Hoffmann. Timo may not be a top 15 fighter at this point in his career, but he’s close to being one. He gave Dimitrenko a lot of problems in their November 2007 bout, knocking Dimitrenko down.
However, Dimitrenko got up off the canvas and took Hoffmann out with some hard combinations in the 12th to get the win. If Hoffmann fights even close to the level that he did against Dimitrenko, Botha will be in serious trouble and will likely get knocked out. Hoffmann will have a five inch height advantage over the 6’2″ Botha, and that could present a big problem for the South African to overcome.
Rendall Munroe vs. Isaac Netty on May 2nd
Super bantamweight Rendall Munroe (18-1, 8 KOs) will go up against Isaac Netty (3-2-1, 1 KOs) for the vacant Commonwealth (British Empire) super bantamweight title on May 2nd at the Crowtree Leisure Centre, in Sunderland, Tyne and Wear. Munroe, 28, recently defended his EBU (European) super bantamweight title in defeating Spaniard Kiko Martinez by a 12-round unanimous decision in February 2009.
Munroe pressured Martinez hard from the beginning, wearing him down with a heavy body attack and getting the better of him in the later rounds. Martinez was able to stay pretty even with Munroe in the first half of the fight, but Kiko was fighting all out and expending a lot of energy to do this. Whereas, Munroe fought very relaxed, taking it easy and staying steady with his combinations and work rate.
Nettey, from Ghana, holds the IBF Continental Africa super bantamweight title.
Is Derry Matthews’ Boxing Career in Jeopardy?
One promising super featherweight contender Derry Matthews (21-3, 11 KOs) suffered his third defeat in his last four fights last Saturday night, losing to little known Harry Ramogoadi by a 4th round TKO at the Echo Arena, in Liverpool, England. What made the loss much worse for Matthews, 25, was that it was his 3rd knockout loss in his last four fights.
He’s not just getting beaten, he’s getting hurt in the ring and taken out by his opponents. Matthews had looked impressive four fights ago, undefeated at 20-0, and ranked high in the International Boxing Federation. It seemed like only a matter of time before Matthews got a world title shot.
Instead, he was destroyed by 37-year-old Mongolian Choi Tseveenpurev (27-0, 19 KOs) in the 5th round in April 2008, getting knocked down three times in the process. It was a punishing loss to the powerful Tseveenpurev, and in hindsight Matthews probably should have taken a year off from boxing to recover from the loss.
Matthews didn’t, though, and came back five months later against another tough fighter Martin Lindsay, and was stopped in the 9th round. In being put in with Ramogoadi (20-10-2, 6 KOs), it was supposed to be an easy fight for Matthews.
However, Matthews looked like a shell of himself in getting battered and taken out in the 4th round by the weak punching Ramogoadi. If this loss doesn’t signal that Matthews needs to take some time off from boxing, I don’t what does. Matthews needs to take it easy for while and give himself time to recover from all these knockouts, and then after a year, Matthews should then pick the sport back up again.