By Leobert Julian A. de la Peña
Marlon Tapales’ camp just issued some bold statements regarding their future 122-pound unification mega-bout against Naoya Inoue eyed this September.
According to JC Manangquil, Sanman Promotions’ head honcho, Tapales and his camp already saw some loopholes in Inoue’s fighting style when they watched his fight against Stephen Fulton.
In an interview with Rappler, Manangquil revealed that they are confident of pulling off an upset victory if Tapales will exploit the lapses that they noticed.
Four months ago, Tapales did the unthinkable after stunning Murudjon Akhmadaliev of Uzbekistan via a split decision to snatch the WBA-IBF super bantamweight titles.
Aside from dethroning the Uzbekistani slugger, Tapales also made history after becoming the first fighter to taint his undefeated record.
With the win, Tapales improved his professional record to 37 wins, 19 knockouts, and three defeats while Akhmadaliev fell to 11 wins and one loss.
On the other hand, Inoue is fresh off a dominant eighth-round knockout win against Fulton last July 25, 2023.
With 2:17 remaining in the round, Inoue perfectly sized up Fulton and threw a vicious right hook set up by a quick left jab.
That thundering right hand then sent Fulton down to the canvass but he managed to beat the eight-count rule of the match referee.
After standing up, Inoue then closed the show in style after sending in a barrage of power punches that forced the referee to stop the fight after shielding Fulton from the crazy sequence.
This is Fulton’s first-ever defeat as a boxing professional and dropped to 21 wins, a loss, and eight knockouts.
Will Tapales become the first man to defeat the Japanese Monster? What adjustments will he make to negate Inoue’s power and tremendous ring pressure?
