YUSUKI KOBORI vs PAULUS MOSES

World championship boxing for 2009 starts off with a double-header in Yokohama on Jan. 3, with Yusuke Kobori defending his WBA lightweight title against undefeated Paulus Moses, of Namibia, while on the same show Toshiaki Nishioka defends his WBC interim super bantam title against Mexico’s Genaro Garcia.

Kobori against Moses should be a toe-to-toe war between fighters who like to put pressure on their opponents.

Moses is little known to all but the most dedicated followers of boxing, but he caught my eye when he stopped a local favourite, Andrei Kudriavtsev, in Ukraine in August 2007. Kudriavtsev had won 20 fights in a row, so this was an excellent performance by Moses.

In my one look at the Namibian, Moses easily overpowered an ordinary but previously durable opponent from Belarus in two rounds, which was his fifth stoppage win in a row.

Kobori caused a slight upset when he moved up from 130 pounds and captured the WBA lightweight title by stopping Nicaragua’s hard-hitting Jose Alfaro in the third round. It looked initially as if Kobori was going to get stopped — he was staggered into the ropes and given an eight count and his left eye was swollen shut, but he caught and stopped the wide-open Alfaro in the third round. It was a dramatic win to be sure, but also showed Kobori's vulnerability against a hard puncher.

Fighting at home in Japan, Kobori is the favourite, but he is a hittable, slugger type and Moses looks strong and heavy handed. It is difficult to know how good Moses really is. As ever with an unbeaten boxer, one probably never knows how good he is until he loses.

This is a mandatory defence for Kobori, so Moses wasn’t a hand-picked challenger. I think that Kobori, unbeaten in the past five years, has boxed at a slightly higher level and will probably come through, perhaps by decision, but this could turn out to be one of those survival-of-the-fittest type of fights where whoever can take the most punishment will be the winner.