Ancajas drops Conlan four times to keep IBF title

CEBU, Philippines — IBF super flyweight champion Jerwin Ancajas of the Philippines retained his title by completely dominating Irish challenger Jamie Conlan at the SSE Arena in Belfast, Northern Ireland Saturday night (early Sunday morning Phl time).

Early in the first round, Conlan took a knee in a delayed reaction after a phantom body shot by Ancajas that signals the direction of the fight. Continuing his attack to the body of his Irish challenger, Ancajas dropped Conlan again in the 3rd and 4th rounds with body shots.

Another body shot dropped Conlan in the 5th round but was ruled a low blow by the referee. Ancajas has been deducted a point as he was already warned by the referee a couple of times earlier for low blows.

In the 6th round, a right cross by Ancajas to the head of Conlan dropped the Belfast native again, who at this time appeared have been getting too much punishment.

Although the brave Conlan was able to beat the count, the referee stopped the contest seeing Conlan unfit to continue.

Ancajas thus successfully defended the title he won from McJoe Arroyo in 2016 for the third time and this opens up for Ancajas to be in the mix to take on the other world champions in the division – Srisaket Sor Rungvisai of Thailand (WBC), Naoya Inoue of Japan (WBO) or Khalid Yafai (WBA).

Ancajas has now improved his record to 28-1-1 with 19KOs, while Conlan suffered his first defeat in 20 fights with 11KOs. — Dong Secuya of Philboxing.com