Japanese welterweight champion Keita Obara of Misako Boxing Gym, unleashing a barrage of left-right combinations from various angles, stopped third-ranked challenger Masaya Tamayama of Teiken Boxing Gym in the fifth round to retain his title on Dec. 9 at Tokyo’s Korakuen Hall.

The technical knockout came 2 minutes and 44 seconds into the round of the scheduled 10-rounder when the referee waved off the fight at the advice of a ringside doctor as Tamayama’s cut above the left eye became worsened.

Obara, ranked ninth both by the World Boxing Organization and International Boxing Federation, decked Tamayama in the first round with a counter right to the head. Tamayama struggled to his feet and managed to survive the round.

The 35-year-old Obara increased his offense while fending off his opponent’s brief rally and landed a variety of blows in the fourth round, which caused the 28-year-old Tamayama to bleed from his left eyelid.

While Tamayama came forward in the fifth stanza, Obara shrugged off his attack and landed combinations blows to the head and body highlighted by a devastating right hook to the head, prompting the referee to stop the fight and asked the doctor to check the injured part of Tamayama eyelid.
It was Obara’s second successful defense of the title he won from Yuki Nagano of Teiken gym in February last year.

With the victory, Obra improved his record to 25 wins, including 22 knockouts, against four losses and a draw. For his part, Tamayama fell to a 14-3 win-loss record with eight KOs.

After the fight, Obara said, ‘’While I failed to attain my KO victory, I was able to hit my opponent from various angles. It has been more than seven years since I first won the Japanese super lightweight title in 2013. It is about time I graduated from competing for Japanese titles. My aim for the next year is to fight a world-ranked boxer at all costs.’’