Fans of the little giants will be pleased and excited to hear how junior bantamweights Fernando Martinez and Kazuto Ioka have agreed to fight a return bout on December 31st, the return filling the customary New Year’s Eve slot in Tokyo, Japan live on ESPN+ at 11 am ET.
There is always some great fight action going down in Japan on the final night of the year, and Martinez-Ioka II promises to be a good one, maybe a truly epic one.
It was back in July when Argentinian warrior Martinez, 17-0(9) took Ioka’s WBA belt 115 pounds while retaining his IBF title. The action was red-hot from beginning to end, and most fans saw a close fight. Instead, quite shockingly, all three judges had it wide for Martinez – very wide on the case of one simply ludicrous card that had Martinez winning every single round at a score of 120-108. Martinez deserved the win, but Ioka, who fell to 31-3-1(16) deserved better from two of the three officials; the two other scores being 117-111 and 116-112 for Martinez.
Now looking to get his revenge, Ioka, who did some tremendous body punching in the July fight, this as Martinez came forward all night long, has to be given a good shot at getting it, even if he is the significantly older man. The July battle was great to watch, with the thrilling encounter boasting a couple of genuine stand out rounds.
Unless Ioka has suddenly “grown old,” with the July war proving to be the last great fight of his long and glorious ring career, we should get another memorable shootout on New Year’s Eve.
Will it be repeat or revenge? If Ioka does reverse his loss here, might we see a trilogy between him and Martinez?
Full Fight card:
- Fernando Martinez vs. Kazuto Ioka, rematch, 12 rounds, for Martinez’s WBA junior bantamweight title
- Hayato Tsutsumi vs. Rene Alvarado, 12 rounds, junior lightweights
- Joe Shiraishi vs. Tsuyoshi Sato, 8 rounds, junior bantamweights
- Masato Shinoda vs. Kenshin Oshima, 8 rounds, featherweights
- Hanyun Wu vs. Yoshimitsu Kimura, 8 rounds, lightweights
- Areji Kato vs. Masahiro Suzuki, 8 rounds, lightweights
- Mao Tameda vs. Tsukuru Midorikawa, 6 rounds, middleweights
- Sora Takahashi vs. Hayato Aiko, 4 rounds, featherweights
- Masahiro Nakata vs. Yuki Yamashiro, 4 rounds, junior featherweights
