THE term “robbery” gets thrown around a lot in boxing circles, but Venezuela’s Carlos Canizales certainly seemed to have been robbed of victory when meeting Panya Pradabsri for the vacant WBC light-flyweight title on his opponent’s home ground in Thailand last December.
Canizales has the chance to put things right when he meets Panya in a rematch on Friday, this time on the Venezuelan boxer’s home turf in Caracas. Watching the first bout online, I had no doubt that Canizales won.
I scored it 116-112. Canizales was the sharper, faster fighter; better everywhere. I even thought he had Panya on the verge of being stopped in the 11th round. It was a majority decision, with Aussie judge Malcolm Bulner scoring 114-114, while the other two judges, whose names were not familiar to me (Antonio Carrillo and Zanashir Taznaa), had Panya winning.
One of the judges even had Panya winning the 11th, which I thought was Canizales’ best round of the fight. Panya kept a tight defence and I’ll concede that he caught a lot of punches on arms and gloves. And Panya scored nicely in spots. But my overall impression was that Canizales dominated proceedings.
Canizales (27-3-1, 19 KOs) must be feeling he can’t get a break on the scorecards.
Before meeting Panya, he lost by majority decision to Kenshiro Teraji in a 108lbs title fight in Japan. Each man was down in that fight. I thought a draw might have been the fairest result, but it was by no means an egregious decision.
All of Canizales’ defeats have been away from home. Stubborn but not particularly skilled Esteban Bermudez knocked him out in the sixth round in Mexico, a fight Canizales was winning until he forgot to duck.
The Bermudez defeat cost Canizales’ the WBA 108lbs title, which he was defending for the fourth time. Now, he finally gets to fight for a title in his own country. Panya (44-2, 27 KOs) has one of those built-up records that we see so often with Thai boxers, but he’s solid in his technique, steady rather than spectacular.
He snapped fellow Thai Wanheng Meenayothin’s winning run at 54-0 to win the WBC title at 105lbs and he made four successful defences, which included beating Wanheng in a rematch. But Panya’s two losses were away from home, in China and Japan. He doesn’t seem to travel well.
Panya Pradabsri vs. Carlos Canizales 2 Fight Prediction
The Caracas site gives Canizales a significant advantage. At 32, he is two years younger than Panya, bigger, stronger, speedier, the better puncher. Canizales, then, has everything going for him in this rematch. The fight has been set up for him to win — now all he has to do is go out and win it. He should do so.
