Mares, Moreno Win Bantam Title Fights In California

The much anticipated Abner Mares vs. Joseph Agbeko IBF bantam title rematch took place Saturday night at Honda Center in Anaheim, CA along with a contest for the WBA 118 pound crown between Anselmo Moreno and Vic Darchinyan.

After Mares barely outpointed Agbeko with the help of numerous and un-penalized low blows this past August, the rematch generated much interest leading up to last night’s clash.

Once the bout started, Agbeko was the aggressor, working behind an accurate jab that had Mares on the defensive until the champion suffered a bad cut in the corner of his right eye in the second frame.

Round three saw a changing of the tides as Mares stepped up his efforts and was in control by the fourth frame. The middle rounds saw Mares winning exchanges and landing the occasional big punch.

Agbeko was definitely in the fight but wasn’t as aggressive as usual although he did mount a serious effort to conclusively take the eighth.

Mares regrouped to regain control in the ninth and never let go of the reigns, enjoying a big eleventh round on the way to posting a 118-110 victory on all three scorecards.

Mares stays unbeaten at 23-0-1 (13) while Agbeko falls to 28-4 (22), having dropped three of his last four contests.

WBA bantam champ Anselmo Moreno, 32-1-1 (11), aptly displayed why he has held onto his title since 2008 with a superb defense against IBO titlist Vic Darchinyan, 37-4-1 (27), in an all-southpaw fight.

As usual, Darchinyan started off in full attack mode but found it difficult to land a flush punch on the much taller champion.

Moreno used a slippery style to not only negate the aggression of Darchinyan but also punished the Australian with sharp counters when Darchinyan missed the mark with wide punches.

The champion wasn’t intimidated by Darchinyan’s strong arm tactics and was never in trouble along the way to winning the bout on all three cards, 120-107, 117-110 and 115-112.