The German professional boxer Vincenzo Gualtieri is world middleweight champion. In his hometown of Wuppertal, the 30-year-old, in high spirits, surprisingly defeated the favorite Brazilian knockout expert Esquiva Falcao and secured the previously vacant IBF World Championship title for the first time.
“Cenzo” deservedly won after twelve rounds with a point decision (116:110, 117:109, 116:110). Felix Sturm last wore this belt as a German before he had to give it to the Australian Sam Soliman in 2014.
The almost 1.80 meter tall middleweight of the Berlin Agon boxing stable got off to a good start and made his opponent stagger in the second round. While the self-confident Gualtieri scored the clearly better hits, the surprisingly passive Brazilian stayed tough. After a deep punch from Gualtieri, Falcao, who had won the 2012 Olympic silver medal, initially went down but continued the fight. It was his first professional defeat.
Falcao had won all his fights before the duel, by knockout. he prevailed in a remarkable 20 out of 30 clashes. Gualtieri went into the fight with 20 wins, seven of which were decided by knockout, one duel ended in a draw.
In the first world championship fight of the evening for the vacant IBO middleweight title, the Italian Etinosa Oliha from the Agon boxing stable had won unanimously on points against the Chilean Julio Alamos. The background to the two vacant belts was that the Kazakh Gennady Golowkin had resigned his titles.
