By Antonín Vavrda/Štefan Moravčík, photos by Filip Škeřík

PRAGUE – A great main event could be seen at the sold-out Lucerna Palace in Prague as the Czech heavyweight warrior Tomas Mrazek (9-45-6, 5 KOs) eventually managed to beat his more famous British opponent Danny Williams (45-20-0, 34 KOs) in a fiercely contested battle via a close split decision.

Boxing in front of two thousand enthusiastic local fans, the 40-year old Williams began the bout in a crushing manner, showering his eight-year younger opponent Mrazek with a flurry of body punches. Mrazek, however, wasn’t rattled, as he began to work with his jab, leaving his rival simply standing in the center of the ring and eating them one by one.

In the beginning of the second, it seemed as if he was a bit wobbled by a jab from Williams to the body, but he managed to get out of trouble, handing his favored opponent a knockdown himself in the third (which, though, wasn’t a regular one, as the Briton simply slipped and then fell onto the ropes).

From the fourth round on, it was clear that both fighters were struggling with their stamina, which eventually forced Mrazek to fight mostly on the outside while utilizing his southpaw stance. Williams, on the other hand, was focusing mainly on his opponent’s body, often dangerously pinning him on the ropes. In the end, though, it was Mrazek who scored the more points from the two and as such had the right to celebrate his biggest triumph to date.

Two of the judges saw the Prague fighter beating the former Mike Tyson conqueror by scores of 60-54 and 57-56, whilst the third gave the fight to the Brixton Bomber, scoring it 58-57 (Profiboxing.cz saw Mrazek winning by 58-56).

In another upset, the Czech boxing legend Roman Kracik (35-11-1, 19 KOs) surprisingly came up short in his heavyweight fight against the debuting Slovak K-1 champion Lukas Horak (1-0-0, 0 KOs), losing a split decision. His fellow Czech great Lubos Suda (31-8-1, 23 KOs), however, managed to keep his unbeaten winning streak at home, beating his countryman Martin Horak (3-1-0, 2 KOs) via a 4th round TKO in a cruiserweight bout.

Also winning was the Slovak fighter Martin Parlagi (13-0-0, 7 KOs). The Prague super-featherweight boxer easily overcame the former amateur European champion and two-time Olympian Khavazhy Khatsyhau from Belarus (10-4-0, 6 KOs), winning a clear-cut unanimous decision. Also, in a battle of two foreign fighters now living and training in the Czech Republic, the Armenian super-middleweight Anatoli Hunanyan (3-0-0, 2 KOs) outpointed the always dangerous Hungarian Attila Kiss (11-68-3, 2 KOs), and, in what was his very first victory via a stoppage, the Czech welterweight Michal Vosyka (2-8-1, 1 KOs) beat his countryman Miroslav Vymyslicky ((0-20-0, 0 KOs) by a 2nd round KO.

Finally, in what was an exhibition match featured in-between bouts, the Czech Republic’s most prominent professional boxer and first ever world champion Lukas Konecny managed to hold off the attack of three separate randomly chosen opponents in a one three-minute round. Cheered loudly by the local fans, each of the three managed to box with Konecny for one-minute, eventually generating a nice sum of 90k Czech crowns (3280 euro) for charity purposes.