By Alexey Sukachev at ringside

Club boxing circuit in Moscow is getting warmer this mid-September with a help of ethnic Armenians. Local promoter Aram Davtyan staged a nice-packed little show at the Artist nightclub in a historical district of Krasnaya Presnya. Accompanying him was a relatively new tiny promotional group Rocky Road Team (leading the same gym in vicinity of the aforementioned district).

Leading the bill was Sochi-based Armenian Vahe Sarukhanyan, 24, originally of Gyumri. He was to continue his Argentinean freeway against reigning national champion Pablo Martin Barboza, 30.

Sarukhanyan started aggressively but soon found out that boxing at a long rage suites his cause better. Barboza, shorter of the two, was trying to get inside but his southpaw stance didn’t help him, while the Armenian was effective with his crisp jab and sudden right hands. From round three Sarukhanyan chose to rely solely on his boxing skills and it has proven to be a right choice.

Meanwhile, Barboza was trying to bully his foe and to make him uncomfortable by his constant pressure and hard punches. He wasn’t that successful in his actions, allowing Vage to smother his bombs and dodged them too. Nevertheless, Barboza has never given up trying to upset his opponent.

In round eight Barboza, energetic as ever, stormed out of his corner for a 30-sec spell of non-stop fire but it took his energy, and the end of the stanza was Sarukhanyan’s. The Argentinean enjoyed a major round nine and looked competitive at the end of the fight to make it close. However, all three judges had it in favour of Vage Sarukhanyan: 99-92 and 100-91 (twice). BoxingScene had it 98-92 – for the Armenian.

Sarukhanyan (11-1-1, 2 KOs), whose only blemishes came against Russian national champion Igor Ivanov, added the second straight Argentinean victim to his list, while Barboza (24-7, 9 KOs) drops down after this loss.

UNDERCARD

Less than a month ago, aforementioned Barboza barely retained his national crown with a split decision over hard-nosed challenger Ruben Dario Lopez. This time Lopez was in his own team, in his corner and fought on the very same card but was less successful than his partner.

Lopez had been being drubbed and beaten by a bigger and better fighter in another Armenian Manvel Sargsyan (8-0, 4 KOs) up until round number four. It was when Sargsyan accelerated and ended matters at 2:04 of the round with a combination of body blows. Lopez is held to 9-6-3, 3 KOs.

Local favorite and former multi-time kickboxing champion Yuri Trogiyanov (1-1), who kicked of his career this May with a stoppage loss to Edwin Solis, decisioned no-hoper Roman Blokhin (0-5) unanimously over four rounds.

In the wildest and most entertaining performance between two lightweight freshmen, Zhora Khamazaryan (1-0) edged Elmir Nadyrov (0-2) with a unanimous decision over four action-packed rounds.

Another debutant Grigoriy Gafarov (1-0, 1 KO) wasted little time in his professional debut against Dmitry Lavrinenko (2-14, 1 KO). Gafarov dropped him in the second with a right corker and methodically got the job done during the next thirty seconds. Official time was 2:37 of the round.