Australian star Jai Opetaia is a two-time world champion as he repeated his 2022 heroics with another gritty victory over Mairis Briedis in Saudi Arabia.
Opetaia outpointed the Latvian to secure a unanimous decision victory with one judge scoring it 117-111 and two scorecards reading 116-112 in the Australian’s favour.
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Opetaia makes a mess of Briedis’ nose | 00:32
The victory secured the IBF cruiserweight world title for Opetaia and he’s already looking towards unifying the division.
“We want the WBO (title) next,” Opetaia said in his post-fight interview.
“We want the winner of (Lawrence) Okolie and (Chris) Billam-Smith, then after that we’re going to collect the rest of the belts.”
One would not bet against that from happening given the early dominance displayed by Opetaia, who ultimately outlanded Briedis with 83 punches from 294 thrown to the Latvian’s 70 from 308.
The rematch shared several trends of their epic first encounter in which Opetaia won on the Gold Coast in 2022.
It was the Aussie who raced out to an early lead on the scorecards, landing several clean shots in the second that left the crowd in Riyadh hopeful of yet another finish on a night filled with stoppages.
But Opetaia, who broke Briedis’ nose with a tight left shot in the sixth round, simply could not put his rival away.
The fight flipped on its head in the 10th round when the Aussie suffered a broken nose himself, but it was later revealed to have come from an unintentional Briedis headbutt.
“He headbutted my nose,” Opetaia said.
“It’s a bit broken, but I’ll get this fixed, fight the next fighter and we’ll be back soon.”
Sensing blood in the water with Opetaia “rocked”, Briedis piled on the pressure in the final rounds but it was ultimately a case of too little, too late for the Latvian as Opetaia boxed intelligently to see out the rounds.
Opetaia’s victory improved his record to 25-0 (19KO) as his attention now turns to conquering the rest of the cruiserweight division.
Source Agencies
