Middleweight Vincenzo Gualtieri has lost his world championship belt again after only one fight. Germany is thus once again without a boxing world champion.
Middleweight Vincenzo Gualtieri has lost his world championship belt again after only one fight. The IBF champion was clearly defeated by the still unbeaten WBO title holder Janibek Alimchanuly from Kazakhstan in a unification fight on Sunday night. The referees took the German out of the fight in the sixth round.
Gualtieri had started as an underdog and was ultimately clearly defeated. In Rosenberg/Texas, Alimchanuly kept his German rival at a distance again and again with punches. In the fifth round, a strong left uppercut caused Gualtieri to falter for the first time. In the next round there were more heavy hits before the referee stopped the fight with a technical knockout.
“I congratulate Janibek, he was better today. He has a hard punch but that knock-out came a little too early,” Gualtieri said. Winner Alimchanuly claimed he knew Gualtieri “wouldn’t fight me head-on, that he would try to tire me out, but he didn’t manage to do that”.
Gualtieri thus missed out on joining an illustrious circle. With a victory, he would have been only the fourth German after Max Schmeling, Dariusz Michaelczewski and Sven Ottke to hold more than one major world title at the same time. Furthermore, no German boxer has been able to win a world title fight in the USA since Schmeling.
The historic opportunity was made possible by Gualtieri – fight name “Il Capo” – a success at the beginning of July in Wuppertal. On that occasion he defeated the Brazilian Esquiva Falcao, who was favoured, with a points victory.
