Sturm beats Zbik easily but Murray is still stalking the champ; Boytsov decisions Guinn

By Boxing News - 04/13/2012 - Comments

Image: Sturm beats Zbik easily but Murray is still stalking the champ; Boytsov decisions GuinnBy Dallan O’ Donnell: In one of his more impressive performances in recent outings WBA middleweight champion Felix Sturm easily beat challenger Sebastian Zbik with Zbik’s corner stopping the fight to prevent their fighter receiving severe punishment for the last few rounds.

Zbik looked dangerous in the opening two rounds but Sturm quickly settled into his rhythm and jabbed Zbik into submission. From then on Zbik offered little to nothing in return, and was in the beaten by one hand. Sturm has a potent jab but the lead hand was mostly all he threw although it did land often, marking the left eye of Zbik badly.

Sturm had said before the fight that he had worked more on his speed and explosiveness and it seemed to pay off as he looked faster than his past two outings. However despite this being a good victory I still believe that if or when Martin Murray gets his rematch with Sturm he will win.

In their last fight I had Murray winning by two rounds going into the twelfth round (which I gave to Sturm) but the judges scored the fight a draw which meant Sturm kept his title. After the bout the WBA rewarded Murray’s performance and placed him as #3 in the world. Murray will fight in June on the Scott Quigg vs. Rendall Munroe card.

He has hoped to fight WBC champion Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. but couldn’t get the paper work done in time. Despite this it seems that if Murray wins his next fight the WBA will install his as the mandatory challenger for Sturm and that would be a fight worth watching.

Sturm had now made 6 title defences, but the 33 year old, in my opinion, will lose his crown if he takes the Murray fight again. Murray may seem the easier option to Sturm however as the only man left for him to fight in the division is Sergio Martinez, and he certainly stands no chance there. Credit where credit is due however, Sturm remains the champion and fought a good fight but the question is how long will he remain as the champion with Martin Murray once again lurking. Follow me on Twitter @dallan09

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In other action on the card:

Maurice Weber TKO 2 Andrei Dolhozhyieu
Adnan Redzovic KO 1 Aliaksandr Makaranka
Mike Keta KO 2 Uladzislau Mahdanau
Denis Boytsov UD 10 Dominic Guinn



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