#WSBV Day 13 – Rafako Hussars Poland and USA Knockouts both seek a valuable victory in Szczecin
17 April 2015
#WSBV Day 11 USA vs Ast
USA Knockouts travel to Rafako Hussars Poland in the penultimate match of the Regular Season with both teams desperately needing a win.
Poland have lost eight of their last nine World Series of Boxing (WSB) matches, while the American Franchise who started the season so well have only won one leg in their last four matches.
Because of the inconsistent form of both teams, this could be one of the most entertaining fixtures of the entire WSB weekend, and Hala Mosrir, Szczecin is the venue for this Group B clash, where on Saturday 18th April fans across the world can watch the action free, live and on demand from 20:30 (GMT +2) at AIBABoxingTV.com.
The most important fight in Poland from an individual standpoint is at Middleweight (75 kg) where 5-1 home star Tomasz Jablonski battles USA’s Anthony Campbell.
Jablonski is currently fourth in the WSB Middleweight rankings, and though he does not have his Olympic destiny in his own hands, he knows victory over Campbell is imperative if he is to have any chance of reaching the Rio 2016 Games through WSB.
Andy Cruz Gomez, Petr Khamukov and Hurshidbek Normatov are all above the Pole in the rankings, so he needs others to slip up even if he achieves success here.
Each of Jablonski’s five wins this season have come against excellent opposition, and he has proved that he is a versatile fighter who can succeed against a variety of styles.
It is perhaps unfortunate for Jablonski though that his week 13 opponent is one of the toughest fighters in the division, because the seventh ranked Campbell has won two of his three away matches in Season V, and possesses a skillset that is difficult to breakdown.
Poland’s Dawid Sebastian Jagodzinski has won two of his three home matches this season, so the durable fighter will look to make it three in a row against USA’s Joshua Franco in the opening match of the evening.
The American star narrowly lost to Kazakhstan’s Temirtas Zhussupov two weeks ago, while his style should gel with Jagodzinski to make a very entertaining match.
Francisco Martinez started Season V in superb form for the Knockouts winning his first four matches and reaching the top of the Bantamweight (56 kg) rankings.
Since then, the young American has lost his last two WSB bouts and has slipped to sixth in the standings.
With his dreams of earning a Rio 2016 Olympic quota through this competition all but over, the talented Martinez must regroup and go back to producing the excellent style of boxing which brought him so much success in the early stages of Season V.
This week he faces the durable 1-3 Sylwester Kozlowski who has the ability to exploit any weaknesses that Martinez may exhibit during their fight.
Light welterweight (64 kg) Kazimierz Łęgowski was stopped by Samat Bashenov a month ago, but returns in Szczecin to face 1-1 Knockout Tra-Kwon Pettis.
A Heavyweight (91 kg) clash ends proceedings in Poland when WSB veteran Michal Olas makes his first appearance of the campaign against USA’s Joshua Temple.
