Inka Laleye nails Manny Woods to grab USA Florida State light middleweight title – Boxing News
Inka Laleye, the surging Nigerian pugilist, collected an impressive split decision win over American Manny Woods and engraved his name on the vacant USA Florida State light middleweight title, his career’s very first title.
The duo headlined the pay-per-view organised and promoted by Aaron Jacobs of Fight Night Productions LLC and the ring for the showdown was set up at A La Carte Event Pavilion in Tampa, Florida, United States. The extravaganza was co-headlined by the six-round
non-title bout between Radivoje Kalajdzic and Mark Sanders.
Inka, 29, was entering in his ninth career and first ever title bout. The Nigerian proud has collected just one of his total four wins by knockout and was taking on Manny for the second time.
In their first encounter, both men gave serious tough time to each other so much so that the six-round clash was later on denoted as a majority decision draw. It is this reason why Inka was eager to take on Woods to prove that he is the best and can nail
the American proud.
His Friday night opponent Woods, 25, possessed a slight upper hand as far as the experience is concerned and was entering in his 11th career bout. The young Saint Petersburg proud has won eight of his total bouts and has collected three of his wins by knockout.
Therefore as far as the stats are concerned, the odds were somewhat in favour of Manny. In addition, Woods was brawling in his home town ring which did aid him in taking on Inka.
Woods was also entering in his first ever title bout and was coming from a win over undefeated Sheldon Moore. Also known as ‘Shake Em' Up’, Manny did strive hard and stunned Inka several times during the initial rounds but was unable to knock the resilient
Laleye out.
For some reason, might probably due to past experience, Inka, also known as ‘The Mighty’, adopted a defensive stance and waited patiently for Woods to make his move. Soon the Nigerian proud realised that his strategy is not working and later on the Mighty
Inka started to shift to his aggressive side.
During the third round, Inka lost a point as he did not stop his battering despite being halted by the bout-referee. It was the fifth round in which Inka started working on his back up plan and while answering Woods earlier aggressive barrage, leashed his
own wave of jabs that connected Manny’s body and face well.
In the last round, both met at the centre of the ring and started pounding each other viciously to grab a knockout win but all their efforts went in vain as the bell rang and the bout went to the judges table.
Two of the three judges awarded the bout and the vacant title to Inka by 76-75 and 77-74 scores whereas the third judge rested his decision in favour of Manny by awarding him 79-72 score.
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