Nishioka Outfights Marquez To Retain WBC Crown In Las Vegas

Former world champion Rafael Marquez hit a roadblock in his return to the super bantamweight division as the Mexican failed to lift the WBC title from Japan’s Toshiaki Nishioka at MGM Grand in Las Vegas, NV.

Marquez started off well, keeping the champion on the defensive with good movement and some success with a hard straight right hand.

Awkward southpaw Nishioka took his time and patiently waited for openings, scoring with his heavy straight left when Marquez was out of position.

Marquez had difficulty getting a good bead on Nishioka, who used angles of retreat to fade away from the Mexican’s follow up attacks any time a good punch landed.

After the midway point in the bout, Nishioka stepped up his efforts and was drilling Marquez with countless lead left hands until the end of the fight.

The ninth saw Nishioka cut on top of his head after a bad head clash and Marquez had his best moments in the second half of the bout during the remainder of the round.

But Nishioka came back in the tenth and eleventh as Marquez simply could not get out of the way of the champion’s fast and powerful left.

Marquez tried to knock out the champion in the twelfth but was basically outfought until the bell rang.

Nishioka swept the cards by scores of 117-111, 116-112 and 115-113, improving to 39-4-3 (24) and retaining the WBC crown for the sixth time.

Marquez drops to 40-7 (36).

There was a short but highly entertaining title fight on the undercard between WBA light fly king Roman Gonzalez of Nicaragua and Mexican challenger Omar Soto.

The first round saw the larger Soto, an experienced flyweight who had fought for the WBO and IBO belts, try to impose his strength advantage and the Mexico City man had some success with body punches and a few shots upstairs.

Soto came in three and a half pounds overweight and despite the fact that he was therefore ineligible to win Gonzalez’s WBA title, the 31 year old had clearly come to win.

But the 24 year old champion never looked bothered and began to use his quickness advantage, outboxing an aggressive, seasoned opponent behind a compact, crisp style.

By the end of the first, Gonzalez, with his power and accuracy, had won a battle of sorts as Soto was now looking to box from distance.

The second started slow with the combatants jabbing at range until Gonzalez came in and a firefight erupted.

Soto landed with a good right followed by a bodyshot with either hand but Gonzalez roared back with a hard right, left uppercut combination that landed flush and put Soto down on his back where he was counted out at 0:36 of the second.

Gonzalez impressively defends his WBA light flyweight title for the second time while improving to 30-0 (25). Soto falls to 22-8-2 (15), and is now 0-4 in world title bouts.