By Ron Jackson

South African flyweight champion Thembelani Nxoshe retained his title when he fought to a 12 round draw against the mandatory challenger Ntlanta Ngamtwini at the Orient Theatre in East London on Sunday afternoon.

Nxoshe (50.60kg) made a sensational start when he dropped Ngamtwini (50.70kg) with a chopping right to the side of the head in the neutral corner, in the opening round. Ngamtwini (14-1-1, 9 KOs) managed to beat the count and held on until the bell.

However, this was the end to the excitement as the fight became a complete bore from round two to twelve with both fighters doing more posing and landing very few scoring blows.

It was literally a sparring match as both fighters threw wild punches and missed badly through most of the rounds.

The busiest man of the day was referee Alan Matakane who had to continuously warn the fighters and break them apart.

At the end of the day, a draw was possibly the best result as neither fighter deserved to win in what was one of the poorest South African title fights in recent years.

Nxoshe took his record to 19-7-2, 6 KOs.

SILILA RETAINS SA JUNIOR-FLYWEIGHT TITLE

Bongani Silila (48.60kg) retained the South African junior-flyweight title with a tenth round stoppage against Luyanda Kwanka (48.20kg). This was a rematch with their first fight in December ending in a draw.

Kwanka (48.20kg) made a good start as he outboxed Silila (48.60kg) who fights from the southpaw stance, through the first four rounds. However, Silila who suffered a small cut over his left eye early in the fight slowly fought his way back into the fight and possibly did enough to shade rounds five to nine.

Kwanka appeared to be holding his own and was in no distress when rather surprisingly midway through round ten his corner threw in the towel. The time was 1:37.

Silila improved his record to 16-5-3, 12 KOs, and Kwanka’s record dropped 9-14-2, 5 KOs.