Former French amateur standout, and reigning French national professional champion, Farida El Hadrati captured the vacant World Boxing Federation (WBF) Womens International Light Welterweight title on Sunday, May 18, at the Cosec La Gauthiere in her hometown of Clermont-Ferrand.
El Hadrati, a late starter in the pros at 30, convincingly defeated Bulgaria’s former European title-challenger Kremena Petkova (21), who came to fight her chance but had to realize she was up against a superior boxer in every department.
Petkova started the fight well, landing with her long jab, but El Hadrati soon found a home for her hard right hand, which quickly caused a swelling on the left cheekbone of the visitor. El Hadrati pressured Petkova in every round, landing well-timed combinations and the straight right, but Petkova gamely did her best to stay competitive.
Moving and jabbing, the Bulgarian tried to keep El Hadrati at bay, but the local girl was just too strong and continued to dominate the action. In the last three rounds Petkova had to hold a bit too much for the taste of referee Christophe Hembert, and was deducted a point in round nine.
While Petkova managed to get through the entire ten rounds, there was no doubt who the winner would be and the judges all scored the bout widely in favor of El Hadrati: 98-91 (Bertrand Chagnoux), 99-90 (Pascal Philibert) and 100-89 (Christophe Hembert).
Farid El Hadrati, winning her first title above domestic level, remains undefeated at 5-0 (3), and the tough Kremena Petkova, having been stopped only by current WBF World Lightweight Champion Delfine Persoon last year, drops to 10-11-1 (1).
Promoter of the fight was ASM Boxe.
As in September, I once again ran out of gas in the 10th & 11th championship rounds of October & November with this column, but I recovered to complete them and will unleash a few more flurries to close out the 12th and final round.
In the first week of October, Hassan N’Dam won a UD over Curtis Stevens in an eliminator for the right to challenge Jermaine Taylor who defeated aging Sam Soliman to regain the IBF Middleweight title. How Taylor even earned this title shot is another story altogether, but it is all irrelevant as he is now the champion. However he will not have too much time to savor his victory as he has assault and battery charges pending against him and an upcoming court fight that may turn out to be the toughest fight of his life, just when things started to look up for him in boxing, we wish him luck.
