IT wasn’t exactly the comeback outcome he wanted, but Nonito Donaire nevertheless emerged successful from a two-year layoff, wresting the interim World Boxing Association bantamweight title from Argentine Andres Campos by unanimous technical decision yesterday in Buenos Aires.
With “The Filipino Flash” gaining momentum, Puerto Rican referee Luis Pabon stepped in to stop the fight one minute into the ninth round when the two rivals clashed heads, with Donaire suffering a nasty cut and unable to see out of his right eye, Jake Donovan of boxingscene.com reported.
The result looked eerily like the unanimous technical decision loss that compatriot Charly Suarez took from reigning World Boxing Organization super featherweight Emanuel Navarrete at the Pechanga Arena in San Diego last May.
But this time, with the match going to the scorecards, it was Donaire, 42, who was triumphant, getting the nod of all three judges, two of them giving him identical 87-84 scores while the other had it 88-83, a remarkable result that placed the Pinoy prizefighter back into the pro boxing spotlight.
“Sorry that this happened. “I wanted to show my fighting heart and warrior spirit to the people of Argentina,” said “The Filipino Flash,” who raised his record to 43 wins, 28 by knockout, against eight defeats.
“Next time, I will give it all and do my best. Today, this is my victory and also Argentina’s victory for this opportunity,” added the boxer, who dealt the younger Campos only his third loss against 17 wins (six KOs) and one draw.
Born in Talibon, Bohol but now fighting out of Las Vegas, Donaire had not fought since absorbing a unanimous decision setback to Mexican Alexandro Santiago in their battle for the vacant World Boxing Council bantamweight strap on July 29, 2023 at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
Donovan reported that “a portion of the downtime was spent recovering from a car crash last March, though the bulk of his time away could be attributed to a planned showdown with (WBA super flyweight champ) Roman ‘Chocolatito’ Gonzalez that never materialized.”
The fight was nearly stopped in the opening round when Campos and Donaire head-butted each other just 90 seconds into the bout, with the former wincing in pain and bothered by his right eye.
But once that incident was behind him, it was the Filipino who showed flashes of his vintage form in the next round, setting up his vaunted left hook as part of a two-punch combination with his right jab that visibly hurt the erstwhile champ.
Looking as fit as a fiddle, Donaire was able to weather the counterattacks of Campos in the middle rounds, going in attack mode and hurting his opponent repeatedly with telling body blows.
Out of frustration against his durable rival, the Argentine flung the Pinoy pug to the canvas in the eighth round after a furious exchange, with Donaire tagging Campos with a solid right straight to the chin just before the round ended.
It was Donaire’s aggressive tactics that eventually ended the match when another clash of heads left him with a closed right eye, obscuring his sight, and that prompted the ring physician to stop the fight.
Donovan noted that the outcome leaves him (Donaire) with a version of the bantamweight title, and now the mandatory challenger to primary WBA titleholder Antonio Vargas, 19-1 (11 KOs).
“A team decision was made last year to make one more run (for Donaire), though the business side of the sport managed to get in the way,” the veteran ring scribe added.
