January 10, Magdeburg, Germany:
Zsolt Erdei, Karoly Balzsay and Pal Bedak, all from Hungary all scored victories on Universum´s Champions Night at the Bördeland Hall.
Erdei retained the WBO title against Ukrainian Yuri Barashian with a unanimous points win. It was scored 116-111 twice and 117-110. Barashian came in overweight and more or less refused to take it off even as the WBO offered him more than the stipulated two hours. As it was Erdei would have kept the title no matter what happend in the ring. The champion fought a smart fight and avoided his powerful opponent while scoring with sharp counters. Barashian had a point deducted in the tenth for low blows. Erdei was rocked in the eighth and cut in the tenth after an accidental clash of heads.
In the co-headliner Karoly Balzsay won the WBO supermiddle with a clear points win over Russian Denis Inkin. It was scored 115-113 and 116-112 twice. Erdei, a southpaw, shook Inkin in the tenth but couldn´t follow up. Balzsay was the sharper of the two but showed a lot of respect for Inkin´s power – at the same time the Russian haven´t showed his power for some time now and never got untracked in this fight either. It was a tactical and tense bout with Balzsay´s sharper, cleaner punches making the difference.
Pal Bedak, short even for a flyweight, impressed in stopping Romanian Laurent Ucristinel Balmau in the third of a scheduled four-rounder. Bedak is now 2-0.
The show opened with lightheavy Igor Michalkin knocking out Sergey Beloshapkin in the fourth of a sc heduled eight-rounder. Michalkin, 7-0, looked good in keeping the pressure up against a neat boxing opponent.
Supermiddle Dimitri Sartison outscored Vasily Andriyanov over eight and got a good workout but never came close to stop or even stun his opponent.
Robert Stieglitz, tonight at lightheavy, stopped ovematched Estonian Dimitri Protkunas in the third. It was scheduled for eight.