Kal Yafai made the second defence of his WBA super flyweight world title against Sho Ishida. Yafai delivered a resounding victory and the scorecards reflected as such, with the three scoring judges handing in unanimous decision verdict with scores totalling 118-110, 116-112 and 116-112.
Yafai controlled the tempo and the dynamics of the fight, utilising his superior ring generalship although Ishida was being comprehensively outboxed, he did have fleeting moments of limited success but it wasn’t enough to be competitive with Yafai on the undercard of Anthony Joshua’s fourth defence of his world heavyweight crown against Carlos Takam in Cardiff.
Yafai shared he wasn’t too impressed with his display in his post-fight interview, declaring “I wasn’t too impressed and felt a bit sluggish, but I got the win against an awkward opponent.”
Yafai also touched on his focus to rest up and let his hands recover ahead of what is set to be a pivotal 2018 for the Birmingham fighter’s career “My hands are sore, so we’ll see how long they will keep me out and I want to get them checked.”
It has been widespread a potential clash with the legendary 4-weight world champion Roman ‘Chocolatito’ Gonzalez has been mooted going forwards for Yafai, but he was tight-lipped on who could potentially be next “Who knows?” Yafai said, before explaining his intention to be out active in the ring again in the first quarter of 2018; “If I could get out in the spring, that would be great” Yafai concluded.