The main event on Telefutura's November 2 edition of Solo Boxeo Tecate, held in Cabazon, California, featured former IBF junior middleweight champion Kassim Ouma, currently ranked #5 by the WBC and #8 by the IBF, against former WBC ranked contender Saul Roman. Roman was coming off consecutive losses to highly ranked contender Sergio Martinez (KO-4) in a WBC eliminator in April and to Danny Stanisavljevic (TKO-4), the "tougher than his sub-.500 record would indicate" journeyman in June.

If Ouma was expecting an easy night, Roman proved him wrong in the very first round. The 27-year-old Mexican attacked with rights to the head and the body, countered well, and then employed his left jab and left hook to build a lead in the round that Ouma, finally landing a few good shots, could not overcome. Roman, who fired right back after getting hit, took the first round.

In the second round, Ouma, utilizing his right jab, set up some quick, hard combinations. He made Roman miss and made him pay for it. Roman was not discouraged and finally landed a solid right to the body. By the end of the round, he tagged Ouma with his right frequently but the round clearly belonged to the former champ.

The third round featured quite a bit of fighting on the inside and Ouma, who drove Roman back with power punches, had the best of it.

In the 4th, Ouma forced Roman back to the ropes and landed effectively throughout the first half of the round. Roman held the advantage in the second half of the round when the fighters exchanged blows as if in an invisible phone booth located in the center of the ring. A 10-10 round seemed appropriate.

Ouma and Roman fought in close again on even terms in the early portion of the 5th round. Later, whenever Roman did have punching room, he fired his right to Ouma's face. Ouma landed some good straight lefts and left crosses in the latter stages of the stanza. A clash of heads opened a cut by Roman's left eye. TTR had Ouma taking the round as he led by 2 points halfway through the bout.

Roman came back to even things up by winning the 6th and 7th rounds. He claimed the 6th with accurate jabs and strong straight rights and, although Ouma had his moments in the 7th, fighting well inside, Roman landed a left with about a minute to go in the round, then drove Ouma back to the ropes. Roman then scored with right uppercut and straight rights.

In the 8th, a more mobile Roman made Ouma miss and countered effectively. When the fighters resumed fighting on the inside, Roman outworked Ouma until a low blow dropped him to the canvas. Referee James Jen-Kin mistakenly ruled it a knockdown. Ouma held a slight advantage during the waning moments of the round but, had it not been for the "knockdown", it would not have outweighed the work Roman had done in the earlier parts of the round. With a two-point swing for the knockdown, the score on TTR's card was transformed from 10-9 Roman to 10-9 Ouma.

Ouma again landed low without penalty in the 9th after Roman had scored with a series of rights and lefts.

Using lateral movement, Roman darted in and out, scoring, then backing off throughout the 10th, winning the round by boxing rather than slugging with Ouma.

TTR scored the bout 96-95 for Roman, who won 95-94 and 96-93 on two cards while Ouma finished ahead, 95-94, on the third.

The split decision win raised Roman's record to 28-4 with 24 KO victories. The disappointed Ouma slipped to 25-4-1 with 1 No Decision and 15 wins by knockout.

Roman, who had been ranked #4 by the WBC until his loss to the 3rd ranked Martinez and #12 before his upset loss to Stanisavljevic, had been dropped to #26 then completely out of the top 40. The unexpected victory over Ouma should get him back in the rankings, possibly back in the top 15.

Incidentally, in the main event of a card held in Woodland Hills, California the same night, Stanisavljevic, also known as "Danny Zee," held comebacking former contender Juan Valenzuela to an 8-round draw.

The semi-final underneath Ouma-Roman was also televised as part of Solo Boxeo. Featherweight Jose Diaz, the 21-year-old brother of WBA, WBO, and IBF unified lightweight champion Juan Diaz, faced journeyman Miguel Munguia in a scheduled 10-rounder.

The bout was evenly contested over the first 5 rounds. Diaz would have been slightly ahead but he lost a point for spitting out his mouthpiece in the 4th round. Replays showed the mouthpiece was knocked out of Diaz' mouth by an overhand right that may have been the punch that broke Diaz' jaw. Despite the injury, Diaz showed his toughness and fought back. He hurti Munguia more than once but could not finish him. The veteran sucessfully went into a survival mode until his head cleared.

Munguia, who came into the bout having suffered 7 consecutive defeats, won 4 of the last 5 rounds on the TTR card turning in particulrly impressive work in the 8th round.

After ten rounds, one judge agreed with TTR by scoring the fight 96-93 in favor of Munguia while another had Munguia by a slightly wider margin, 97-92. The third judge saw it a bit closer, as did Telefutura's ringside analyst, 95-94 for Munguia.



The upset unanimous decision improved Munguia's record to 16-7-1 (13 KO's) as per Telefutura and FightNews or 16-9-1 (13 KO's) as per BoxRec. Diaz suffered his first loss as a professional and is now 14-1 (4 KO's).

In a third scheduled 10-rounder, which was on the non-televised portion of the card, WBC 19th ranked bantamweight Nelson Rocha (18-1, 6 KO's) TKO'ed Cesar Morales (19-6, 13 KO's) at 0:51 of the 9th round.