By Jim Dower: Unbeaten former 2000 Olympic heavyweight Gold Medalist for Germany Sebastian Koeber (19-0, 13 KO’s) defeated heavyweight prospect Markus Tomala (6-1, 3 KO’s) by a 10 round split decision for the interim German BDB heavyweight title on Saturday night at the Stadthalle, Rostock, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Germany. The final judges’ scores were 97-94, 96-94 for the 30-year-old Koeber and 96-94 for Tomala. I had Koeber winning the fight eight rounds to two.
However, there was very little action in the fight other than brief combinations from the 26-year-old Tomala. Koeber, who used to be a knockout puncher earlier in his career, appears to have gone through a dramatic style change and now fights a lot like Zsolt Erdei and Felix Sturm. In other words, Koeber mostly jabs and throws little else.
It’s very boring to watch but effective in beating limited fighters without much talent. However, at 6’3 ½” 223, it’s doubtful that Koeber will ever be anymore than a local fighter. He lacks size and power to compete against the harder punching and larger heavyweights in the division. In Germany, through, Koeber can have a nice career fighting the less dangerous heavyweights that Germans have fighting for them.
Koeber set the pace for the fight in the 1st round, throwing jab after jab and rarely letting loose with a right hand. This is a dramatic departure from Koeber’s old style in which he would try to bomb out his opponents with heavy right hands. Koeber, in fact, has a good hand and world class power with that punch. But his chin, lack of hand speed and size are limiting factors for him.
Koeber continued to dominate in rounds two through six, landing his powerful jab over the guard of Tamala and scoring with it. Tamala would fire off a big right or left every once in awhile, but Koeber didn’t make it easy for him as he would move away quickly when Tamala would come at him.
This later caused Tamala to have to chase Koeber at a near run just to catch him with any shots. It made for boring action with the running and jabbing from Koeber. The German fans had already seen a number of dull fights on the card, but this was just one more. Tamala made it close in the 6th by catching up to Koeber and tagging him with a number of hard left-right combinations to the head near the end of the round.
Koeber had controlled most of the round with his jab but was suddenly under siege late when Tamala seemed to get annoyed and come after Koeber. The 7th and 8th rounds had little if any action to speak of. Koeber jabbed and Tamala chased after him and rarely was able to catch up to him.
The 9th round was more of the same, with Koeber continuing his jab clinic. In the final round, Koeber circled the ring throwing jabs and avoiding a desperate looking Tamala, who never did catch Koeber in the round. This was one of the least interesting heavyweight bouts I’ve seen in some time.