Uzbekistan’s light flyweight Hasanboy Dusmatov earned his seventh successive win for the Otamans in the opening contest by overcoming Belik Galanov.

The advantage was doubled after the second bout of the evening as Ukraine finally won their first match of the season at light welterweight.

Volodymyr Matviichuk had lost two contests in the winless run, but delivered a superb performance against Grigorii Lizunenko, the Russian National Championships bronze medallist, to win on points.

Following the early Ukrainian successes, Russia’s Petr Khamukov needed to win at middleweight if his franchise was to have any chance of winning the overall contest.

Khamukov was much stronger than Hurshidbek Normatov, despite being the shorter fighter, and used his boxing brain to manhandle his undefeated opponent across the ring throughout the meeting.

After five rounds, Khamukov’s hand was raised, earning Russia their first victory of the match, and moving him back to the top of the middleweight rankings where an Olympic quota place for Rio 2016 awaits.

Russian bantamweight Vladimir Nikitin then evened up the scoring, and secured an Olympic quota spot for his country in the process  with a unanimous points win against Omurbek Malabekov.

Considering the gulf in the rankings between the two fighters it was a surprisingly close fight, but the exemplary Nikitin eventually pulled away and sealed the win. 

With everything to play for heading into the last match of the evening at heavyweight, two men making their first appearances of the season competed against each other.

Ukraine’s Gevorg Manukyan was a relative unknown in WSB heading into the bout, but made a huge name for himself by outperforming Russia’s Sergey Kalchugin and secured a memorable win for his team.

Manukyan displayed tremendous stamina for a heavyweight, leaving Kalchugin stunned by the accuracy of his shots.

Ukraine Otamans visit Cuba Domadores in the last match of the regular season, while the Russian Boxing Team travel to Morocco Atlas Lions.

Earlier in the night, Mexico Guerreros kept alive their hopes of reaching the knockout stages with a solid 4-1 away victory against the China Dragons in Sanya.

The Mexican franchise find themselves two points behind third-placed Ukraine after returning to winning ways, and complete their regular season at home to the British Lionhearts.

The Lionhearts were on the receiving end of a 5-0 hammering by runaway leaders Cuba Domadores, who made it 13 wins out of 13 at the Copper Box on the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in London.  

The Domadores team entered the fixture following the announcement that the International Boxing Association had become the exclusive partner for all boxers from the Cuban Boxing Federation whenever they compete in international competition. 


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