Stieglitz knocks out Acosta; Menzer defeats Kuehne

Robert Stieglitz successfully defended his super middleweight title for the first time by stopping late replacement Ruben Eduardo Acosta in the fifth round.  Acosta came in with an extremely awkward and wild style, sort of like a less skilled version of Sam Soliman, and was almost immediately able to catch Stieglitz off guard.  However, as Stieglitz began to establish the jab, he took over the fight, albeit with Acosta occasionally landing a wild shot.  In the third round, Stieglitz rushed in and landed a solid left hook that knocked Acosta squarely on his behind.  In the fifth round, Stieglitz hurt and knocked down Acosta on a body shot while he was stuck in a corner.  Stieglitz pounced back on him, and was able to get the referee to intervene for the TKO win.  Stieglitz moves to 37-2, while Acosta falls to 23-4-5.

On the televised undercard, women's undisputed featherweight champion Ina Menzer scored an exciting victory over game Ramona Kuehne, who was seeking a title in her third weight class, having already won belts at lightweight and super featherweight.  This was one of the bigger women's fights that could be made in Germany, where women's boxing is as popular as anywhere, yet it was still on the undercard of a fringe title fight and received a tepid reception.  If there are more women's clashes like this one, maybe it will help change people's minds.  In an all-action fight, Kuehne kept coming in with awkward angles and big punches, bruising and bloodying Menzer, while Menzer kept applying accurate straight punches that seemingly couldn't miss Kuehne.  Both fighters looked like they had just walked out of a car crash by the time this one was over, and a high level of skill and guts were on display throughout.  With lots of back and forth action and the tide of the fight turning several times, the fight was stopped by the referee due to cuts and swelling around Kuehne's left eye, leading to a technical knockout for Menzer in the 6th round.  This wasn't just a great women's fight, but a great fight overall.  If you have any interest in women's boxing whatsoever, it's worth tracking down a copy of this one, as this was just a flat out war.

Also on the televised undercard, Syrian heavyweight Manuel Charr (14-0) scored a last minute technical knockout over Owen Beck (29-4).  For a few rounds, Beck seemed to be schooling the very straightforward Charr, if anything, but eventually the plodding and forward-moving Charr was able to catch up with Beck by applying consistent pressure, and he was clearly beating Beck in the later rounds.  With about 30 seconds left, he bum rushed forward behind a flurry of punches, which left Beck on weak legs, prompting the referee to step in and stop the fight. 

On the untelevised undercard, Zack Page kept up his spoiling ways, defeating previously undefeated prospect Sebastian Koeber.  Page's record may only be 20-27-2, but he's as tough of an out as any gatekeeper, and he's sent several prospects crashing back to earth lately.  He's taken the "0"s from formerly hyped Kasim Howard, Mean Gene Hill and now Koeber in the past couple years, and he hasn't really faced a bad fighter in his last 17 fights.  Also on the untelevised undercard, Khoren Gevor and Denis Boytsov won in stay-busy bouts.