By Srithar Visuasam: Friday night saw the ninth annual Bob Rose Cup take place at the Malvern Town Hall, Melbourne Australia, hosted by Peter Maniatis Promotions.
The main event saw light heavyweights Manny Vlamis (9-2, 5 KOs) and Kashif Mumtaz (8-25-1, 6 KOs) take to the ring to contest for the Bob Rose Cup and Victorian light heavyweight title. The two had previously fought before in August 2008 with Mumtaz emerging a winner via majority points decision over six rounds. The rematch was quite a rough affair, with the referee warning fighters for various indiscretions in the early rounds. Vlamis began to find his range after the first couple of rounds, tagging Mumtaz with some clean shots which shook the tough New Zealander.
In round 3, Vlamis received a one point deduction for hitting Mumtaz at the back of the head, however later in the same round Mumtaz also received a one point deduction for holding Vlamis. Round 4 saw Vlamis drop Mumtaz, however Mumtaz kept coming forward to give challenge Vlamis. In round 5, Vlamis pushed Mumtaz against the ropes which Mumtaz claimed to injure his arm, where he told the referee he couldn’t continue the bout.
Vlamis was then declared the winner via technical knockout. The stoppage was loudly protested by spectators ringside, to which Mumtaz post fight repeatedly took the microphone to explain his injury and issues with the fight. Promoter Peter Maniatis even asked the referees whether they could re-commence the fight given the controversial ending, as Mumtaz stated he was ready to continue, to no avail given Vlamis had already been declared the victor.
The remainder of the evening was a very exciting night of boxing. In the main supporting bout, super middleweight Pradeep Singh (17-3-1, 9 KOs) looked impressive in disposing Iranian Amir Ranjdar (8-14, 5 KOs) in the fourth round of their scheduled eight round bout.
The fight of the night was the bout between Dinesh Kanth (2-1, 1 KO) and Callan Orchard (5-2, 2 KOs), with the two light heavyweights taking place in arguably the most explosive round in Australian boxing this year. Kanth came out very aggressive and took the centre of the ring throwing some heavy punches, however within the first minute Orchard saw an opening and landed an uppercut flush on Kanth’s chin which buckled his knees to centimetres from the canvas. The fight appeared that it was close to reaching its conclusion with Orchard moments later dropping Kanth who took a standing eight count.
With the momentum clearly in his favour, Orchard looked to capitalise, but it was Kanth who found a response, dropping Orchard this time with a heavy right hand. After waiting for Orchard to get resume from his corner, Kanth charged to Orchard landing a few more shots, dropping him once again and upon his second standing count, the fight was waved off with Orchard deemed not able to continue. Kanth celebrated the win with a cartwheel and the crowd cheered an excellent fight, with both fighters giving it their all whilst the bout lasted.
In other bouts, undefeated Terry Tzouramanis (4-0, 1 KO) outworked a tough Chad Roy Naidu (2-12-3, 1 KO) over six rounds, with the scorecards reading 59-55, 59-55 and 60-55 in Tzouramanis favour. The other three bouts saw three first round stoppages with light heavyweight Joe D’Angelo (2-2-1, 1 KO) defeating Paul Bourke (2-6-1), junior middleweight Michael Zerafa (3-0, 2 KOs) stopping Jean Claude (1-12-1) and welterweight Robert Monitto (3-6, 2 KOs) defeating debutant Drew Mackie (0-1).