Naphapol Kiatisakchokchai has been defeated by Toshiaki Nishioka in the WBC super bantamweight “interim” champion title match on September 15 at Yokohama, Japan.

The southpaw Nishioka made an aggressive move on Naphapol immediately when the first round started, but the Thai boxer kept his guards up and was able to block the one-two punches. At the end of the round, Naphapol tried to hit the Nishioka’s body with his right hook, but the Japanese did not stop pressuring him with the double strikes.

In the second round, each boxer continued to take turns to hit each others, but Nishioka diverted his attacks to Naphapol’s body. Despite some heavy hitting, the two seemed to be on an equal footing.

In the third and fourth round, Nishioka employed a strategu to hit and then dodge to the side and was able to control the game, while Naphapol’s fists kept missing. The Japanese launched some hard hits to the Thai’s body in the fifth round, but Naphapol did not changed his tactic and continued to approach Nishioka despite obvious wounds at his lips. He took several other combo hits on his face.

In the sixth round, both sides still used the same tactics with Naphapol pressing forward and Nishioka focusing on countering and side stepping. In the seventh round, Nishioka’s well-timing uppercuts from the side hit Naphapol’s chin several time, but the Thai kept walking toward the Japanese.

The seven and eight rounds were not much different from the earlier fight, but, by the tenth round, Nishioka became significantly exhausted. The referee penalized Naphapol for a head clash that caused the Japanese to bleed profusely from the cut above his right eye.

After a short break for the doctor to examine Nishioka, the game was resumed, this time with Naphapol as an effective aggressor. The referee penalized Naphapol’s scores for pushing the exhausted Nishioka to fall on the canvas.

At the end of the twelfth round, both boxers were still standing but it was Nishioka who became the winner and the WBC interim title holder by a unanimous decision with scores of 117-109, 117-109, and 119-107. By that time Naphapol had a swollen face especially the area under his right eye.