Scott Quigg vs Kiko Martinez Preview July 18th
Manchester, England will be the site of this weekend’s title fight between unbeaten WBA Super Bantamweight Champion Scott Quigg of England and challenger Kiko Martinez of Spain. This 12-round bout can be seen live in the UK from the Manchester Arena on Sky Sports. This is Quigg’s first fight of the year and it’s the first time he’s been back in the ring since undergoing hand surgery. His last bout was via decision victory against Hidenori Otake in November.
The 26-year-old Quigg enters the ring with a near-perfect record of 30-0-2 with 22 Kos while the 29-year-old Martinez is 32-5 and has 24 Kos to his name. Martinez is a former IBF champion who lost his belt to Carl Frampton of Northern Ireland. Quigg had hoped to be taking on Frampton to unify the titles, but the Belfast native will be fighting in El Paso, Texas the same gay against Alejandro Gonzalez of Mexico. Quigg would still like to meet Frampton at some time, but also has his eye on former WBA champion Nonito Donaire of the Philippines, who’s also in action this weekend.
Of course, Quigg has to get past Martinez first and that’s not exactly an enviable task. Martinez admits that Quigg is a solid boxer, but is confident he’ll be able to lift his crown in the Englishman’s backyard. Martinez will be depending on his better-than-average power in this bout and would like to lure Quigg into a toe-to-toe brawl if he possibly can. Quigg has decent power too, but Martinez definitely has the edge in that department and he’s a step up in class compared to the champion’s previous list of opponents.
Martinez has lost five fights, but he’s been stopped just once, which was by Frampton. The Spaniard likes to slug it out and isn’t hard to find or hit. However, he does possess a pretty solid chin. This is also Martinez’s first fight since November, when he stopped George Gachechiladze in the second round in Barcelona. Martinez is used to fighting on the road and has faced several British opponents in the past.
Quigg has gone 145 rounds since turning pro back in 2007 and has a decent knockout ratio of 69 per cent. He stands 5-feet-8-inches tall with an unlisted reach. Martinez will be at a height disadvantage as he’s 5-foot-5 and has a 66-inch reach. He turned pro in 2004 and has 212 rounds under his belt. Martinez has a knockout ratio of 65 per cent, which is slightly lower than Quigg’s but he has more power than the champ.
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Prediction
This should be a case of boxer (Quigg) vs slugger (Martinez). Quigg should be able to catch Martinez coming in due to his reach advantage, but his chin is going to have to hold out. Quigg has the better boxing skills and he’ll need to use them to rack up points on the scorecards. If Quigg can handle Martinez’s power he should keep his belt by a relatively close decision on Saturday.
Odds
Sportsbook 5dimes.eu has the latest odds on all of the big fights. The odds of a Quigg victory are currently listed at -525 while a Martinez win is listed at +415. Visit 5Dimes.eu to see up to date odds and to bet on this fight. You should also check out our recent boxing betting predictions to see how we’ve done.
Kiko Martinez betting • Scott Quigg betting