FERNANDO MONTIEL vs DIEGO SILVA

Saturday night sees another of promoter Bob Arum’s “Latin Fury” shows, this one from Tijuana, the border city currently troubled by a spate of murders. I tend to the view that people simply going to a boxing match will be safe enough: sometimes in cities that are considered dangerous to be in, the danger is being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

I plan to preview all the fights on the show. Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. is once again in the main event, and Humberto Soto and Fernando Montiel are also on the show.

Montiel, who won world titles at flyweight and junior bantam, bids to become a three-weight world champ when he meets Diego Silva, of Argentina, for the vacant WBO bantamweight title.

In a previous attempt to win this title, Montiel was outpointed by the bigger and harder punching Jhonny Gonzalez. It was a split decision, but Gonzalez controlled the fight and was the obvious winner.

That was three years ago, and Montiel has matured physically and also become more aggressive. He seems to be concentrating much more on landing hard shots in recent fights as opposed to the fast-moving, in-and-away style of earlier bouts.

I don’t think that Montiel was really ready to move up in weight when he met Gonzalez. He boxed well but cautiously and I think he was very conscious of Gonzalez’s ability to hurt him. Montiel tried to steal a decision by sneaking points and then darting out of range but it didn’t work out for him.

Montiel has won six in a row since then, and at the age of 30 he is probably at his peak, although he was a bit disappointing in his last fight when he reverted to a counter-punching style against the rough, tough, aggressive Juan Alberto Rosas. Montiel won it clearly enough but he looked quite uncomfortable at times.

On Saturday, Montiel meets a once-beaten opponent who is clearly making a big step up in class.

Silva, 25, has never boxed outside of South America and he has not fought at a very high level.

I did get to see one of his fights, the eighth-round KO win over Ramon Torres last June, and Silva seemed to be quite a solid, compact sort of fighter who went forward and worked busily, nothing special but capable. Silva was dropped in the second round when he walked into a right hand, but he bounced right up and it seemed to me that he was dominating the fight.

The ending to that fight was spectacular. Torres started to throw a right uppercut and Silva beat him to the punch with a right hand, right down the middle, dropping his opponent flat on his back. It looked as if Torres was out before he hit the canvas.

Despite that impressive finish, I don’t think that Silva is a terribly hard hitter. I think that he had a perfect opening, and landed a perfect punch, against Torres.

Silva did have a durable look about him but he was down twice in a fight against Diego Hernandez, who outpointed him in Silva’s only defeat.

That loss looks bad on Silva’s record because Hernandez seems quite ordinary. I don’t know what happened in the two knockdowns. Maybe they were flash knockdowns such as the one Silva suffered against Torres. Still, a fighter with world-class pretensions shouldn’t be losing to the likes of Diego Hernandez, let alone getting put on the floor by him.

Silva might have simply had a bad night, but even giving him the benefit of the doubt it does seem that he simply isn’t in the same class as someone with Montiel’s talent and world-class experience.

I didn’t think that Silva looked “chinny” (as the British would say) when I saw him, but he has been down several times in his career, and he is meeting a hurtful hitter in Montiel.

If Silva brings the fight to Montiel the way he did when he fought Torres, he is likely to get countered by the sort of shots he has never been hit with before. I think that Silva will give a respectable performance but there simply seems too wide a gulf in talent and firing power for the Argentinean to be given much of a chance. I think that Montiel will look impressive in this fight, and I can see him stopping Silva somewhere around the ninth round.