MANILA, 21 March 2003 — Almost but not quite.
Filipino world champion Manny Pacquiao came close to screaming disaster only to steal victory from the jaws of defeat.
Pacquiao, the reigning International Boxing Federation (IBF) champion, fought mightily back to knock out Serikzhan Yeshmangbetov of Kazakhstan in the fifth round of their scheduled 10-round non-title bout before a thrilled hometown crowd at the Luneta Park.
The crowd erupted in frenzy as Pacquiao notched his 37th win against two defeats and a draw. That scary escape was his 28th knockout win. Lustily cheered on by a mammoth hometown crowd, the southpaw Pacquiao floored his worthy foreign opponent in an up-from-the-floor fifth-round win that served the Filipino boxing idol a lesson well
Obviously, the victory did not come easy for Pacquiao, the country’s lone world champion today. The unfancied Kazakh turned out to be a tough-as-nails puncher who came to within a punch away from registering one of the biggest upsets in local ring history.
The General Santos City slugger had to survive the bout, particularly when Yeshmangbetov decked him in the fourth round. It marked only the fourth time in a colorful professional career that Pacquiao suffered a knockdown.
Yeshmangbetov had his nose bloodied since the first round and had an ugly mouse under his left eye by the third. Still, he refused to run as was expected, trading mean punches with the sentimental favorite.
Pacquiao told promoter Bebot Elorde that he only allowed the fight to get exciting, but he later admitted he was very confident of dismissing his opponent.
“The observation of the boxing people that Yeshmangbetov was just a patsy may have gotten into his head,” Nazario said the day after the fight. “Maybe, he thought, he could easily rip the Kazakh apart. But Yeshmangbetov was durable and he came to fight.”
“I take the blame for that (knockdown in the fourth),” admitted Pacquiao, who was mobbed by his cornermen when the end game for the Kazakh. He said the crowd’s wish to see him knock Yeshmangbetov as quick as possible, prevented him from following the script laid out by his cornermen.
Pacquiao ran straight into Yeshmangbetov’s short thunderous right, sending him on the seat of his black trunks, as stunned as he was dazed. Pacquiao dismissed the knockdown as a sort of a lucky punch from Yeshmangbetov moments after the fight, but later admitted that he thought the Kazakh would easily fold.
“That was what I feared most, his lucky punch. But then, I immediately regained my poise and became more cautious,” he said.
Pacquiao — out of embarrassment and bravado — got up as the third man was just about to start his count. He was immediately up for the mandatory eight-count and used the following seconds to dance around and recover his bearing. Once he did, Yeshmangbetov found himself in deep trouble. All of a sudden, Pacquiao was on the attack near the end of the round, Yeshmangbetov saved in part by the tape that came loose on his left glove and needed to be re-attached. The tape again came undone, but this time early in the fateful round. And the brief lull was enough to further pump-up Pacquiao, who has been chipping at Yeshmangbetov’s chiseled features since the opening bell with his vicious left. Pacquiao threw a poison-packed left straight to the face of his opponent who hit the canvas and be counted eight. More vicious lefts to the head and face by Pacquiao sent Yeshmangbetov almost halfway out of the ropes near his own corner.
Although Yeshmangbetov immediately sprang up, referee Ver Abainza promptly stopped the fight at 1:52 of the 5th, giving Pacquiao his 28th KO win in a record that also has 37 wins, two losses and one draw.
The defeat dropped Yeshmangbetov to a 13-11-1 record. But it was one which his Australian manager said is easy to swallow.
“We knew we had a good chance and we showed to the Filipino people that we could give Manny a good fight,” said David Leigh, whose ward was given an appreciative postfight applause by the crowd, estimated to be as large as 300,000.
Meanwhile, Luisito Espinosa — the former WBC featherweight titlist — has offered his services to be the sparring partner of Pacquiao should the latter decide to campaign in the heavier featherweight division.
According to Espinosa’s manager, Emmanuel “Noel” Rivera, the former world champion believes Pacquiao has all the skills and power to conquer the featherweight division he once ruled.
Rivera said they received an offer from Elorde to fight Pacquiao in a non-title fight this March which he turned down.
