Terrazas backs Munroe to become world champion
Mexico’s Victor Terrazas, beaten by Rendall Munroe in their super-bantamweight world title final eliminator at the weekend, believes the Leicester binman has the measure of WBC champion Toshiaki Nishioka. Munroe impressively stopped Terrazas in round nine at the Coventry Skydome on Friday night and can now look forward to a world title crack against Japan’s Nishioka
“Terrazas’s promoter, Hector Garcia, informed us in the dressing room afterwards that Terrazas had been over to Japan and has sparred Nishioka and he said that Rendall would beat him easily. Rendall’s far too strong, fit and ambitious for Nishioka, in Terrazas’s opinion. That’s a nice thought for us to have in our minds if we do have to go over to Japan to challenge for the title,” said Munroe’s manager, Mike Shinfield to BoxRec News.
Munroe recovered from a cautious start to grind down the nimble Terrazas, repeatedly pounding the Mexican to head and body until he could take no more.
“Rendall fought the perfect fight. It was always our intention to allow Terrazas to blow himself out for the first three or four rounds without us getting in any trouble. Then Rendall would start to come on strong which is exactly how it turned out. The body shot that finished him was a good shot but it was the sheer accumulation of punches from Rendall that took its toll in the end,” reasoned Shinfield.
Initial talks between Munroe’s promoter, Frank Maloney, and Nishioka’s representatives have already taken place but both camps understandably want home advantage.
“We have told the Japanese that we want the fight over here but at the end of the day it will come down to money. Boxing is big in Japan, it attracts big crowds and the Japanese have a lot of money behind them plus Nishioka is the champion. It will come down to what kind of financial backing we can get from television over here as to whether we can tempt Nishioka to defend his title in England,” Shinfield explained.
The 33-year-old Nishioka, 35-4-3, is undefeated in six years and will a voluntary defence of his WBC crown in Tokyo this Friday (April 30) against the unbeaten Balweg Bangoyan (15-0, 6 inside) from the Philippines.
“From what my sources are telling me, this should be a fairly comfortable voluntary title defence for Nishioka. However whoever wins Rendall is now the WBC’s official challenger,” reiterated Shinfield.
Depending on how long Munroe will have to wait for his world title opportunity, the Leicester southpaw may decide to relinquish his European crown which he has made five successful defences of, clearing the way for Nottingham’s official EBU challenger Jason Booth to contest the vacant title.
“The EBU ordered that Rendall must defend his title against Jason Booth and Frank Maloney did propose a date on which the fight can happen. If you were to speak to Booth’s camp though I’m not so sure they want the fight. Rendall and Jason are good mates and neither of them would particularly like to fight each other, given the choice. At the moment, things are a bit up in the air and Rendall is still the European champion,” said Shinfield, who previously managed Booth.
