Windhoek

Namibia’s African cruiserweight champion Vikapita ‘Beast Master’ Meroro’s plans of returning home with the WBA International Cruiserweight title backfired when he suffered a 6th round knockout at the hands of Dmitry Kudryashov in Moscow, Russia on Friday.

Meroro started the fight on a positive note and managed to frustrate the ‘Russian Hummer’, as Kudryashov is affectionately known, with some great combinations and quickly clung onto the gigantic Russian before he could get a chance to unleash his red-hot punches.

He successfully continued using the ‘hit and hold’ technique until the 5th round, leaving little room for Kudryashov to smoothly go about his business – but Meroro somewhat appeared to be slowing down towards the end of the round.

In the 6th round, a clearly worn-out Meroro could not keep up with the pace and strength of the Russian as he started running for safety but an evidently frustrated Kudryashov kept chasing down the Namibian and finally caught him on the ropes with an avalanche of strong body shots that dropped Meroro.

He however managed to beat the count and was soon back in action but Kudryashov was not yet done with Meroro, this time catching him again on the ropes with a killer sucker punch to the ribs that had the challenger slumbering around in obvious agony and failing to recover to make the second count.

“Meroro fought a very technical, tough and smart fighter who is undefeated, so I’m really not so disappointed with his overall performance.  We had a very good game plan to outbox and frustrate Dmitry by hitting and clinging on to him, while also making him miss a lot. Meroro followed him very well but somehow started relaxing in the 6th round, and was unexpectedly caught with a sucker punch and failed to beat the count,” said Tobias.

“Meroro is a class fighter and a champion. This defeat will not be viewed as a failure. It’s a lesson learned. We will go back to the gym and work harder and smarter, otherwise Meroro is doing fine physically and emotionally.”