Koki Kameda retains world title

OSAKA — Koki Kameda successfully defended his WBA bantamweight title, but his brother Daiki lost a unanimous decision to WBA super flyweight champion Tepparith Kokietgym in the main event of a world championship doubleheader Wednesday.

Koki, the oldest of the three Kameda boxing brothers, stopped 12th-ranked Mexican Mario Macias in the fourth round with a flurry of body blows in his third title defense at Osaka Prefectural Gymnasium. Koki sent Macias to the canvas with a left hook in the opening round and again with a left in the third round before finishing him off 2 minutes, 4 seconds into the fourth.

"It feels so good to fight in my native Osaka," Koki said. "It was my best bout ever in the bantamweight class. I was in good form. I was able to see all of his punches."

He improved to 27-1 with 17 knockouts.

Later in the night, top-ranked Daiki and the Thai champion exchanged hard punches throughout the bout, but Tepparith was more effective in his first title defense.

The judges scored the bout 115-113, 116-112 and 119-110 in favor of Tepparith. Daiki dropped to 22-3 with 14 KOs.

If Daiki had won, he and Koki would have become the first Japanese boxing brothers to win world belts in multiple weight classes.

"I'll accept my defeat," Daiki said. "As a challenger, I wanted to give him a good fight. I just wasn't good enough against him."

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