LUZON Professional Boxing Association number five-ranked Noel Sungahid took a third round loss against WBC International super flyweight champion Sylvester Lopez in the main event of an interesting fight card at the Elorde Sports Center in Paranaque Saturday.

In the bantamweight battle scheduled for 10 rounds, the aggressive, hard-hitting Lopez dropped Sungahid for eight counts in round two before dropping him once again in the third round, after which referee Ver Abainza realized the veteran southpaw was in no position to continue and very correctly called a halt to the bout at 2:52 of round three.

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Sungahid is fighting under Brico Santig stable, who had a total of 49 fights with 23 wins as against 21 losses and five draws with 16 knockouts, caught Lopez with a couple of solid punches early in the fight, which seemed to unnerve the WBC International champion.

But Lopez soon got his bearings and wore down Sungahid with vicious body shots and right hooks to the side of the head. When the fight was called off, Sungahid had a huge welt under his left eye as result of the pounding from Lopez.

With the win, Lopez improved to 10-2-1 with seven knockouts.

The promising protégé of promoter Gabriel "Bebot" Elorde Jr. won the WBC International title with an 8th round TKO over previously undefeated Korean champion Jong Nam Park last April 5 at the Ynares Center in Pasig City.

In a companion 10-rounder, WBC Asian Boxing Council light flyweight champion Julius Alcos won a split decision over Erwin "Roy Jones" Picardal who benefited from the fact that referee Gene del Bianco deducted two points from Alcos in the third round for what the referee ruled as a "deliberate low blow," which was the second such infraction committed by Alcos.

However, Alcos fought back furiously to erase the two-point deficit and caught Picardal with some solid combinations and had him in deep trouble in the closing minute of the fight but couldn't put him away.

Picardal, who switched to a southpaw stance from time-to-time, was a game fighter but lacked the class of Alcos.

With the win, Alcos, an accomplished fighter improved to 17-6-0 with 3 knockouts while Picardal from the Aljoe Jaro stable dropped to 9-14-2 with 2 knockouts.

Featherweight Ronel Esparas, a lanky southpaw with former Philippine champion Emil Romano working the corner, put on a fine performance to upset favored Ryan Sermona, scoring a unanimous eight round decision.

Esparas appeared to tire in the end but somehow dug deep inside of him to catch Sermona who tried desperately but unsuccessfully to go for a knockout. Esparas outboxed the strongly built Sermona and caught him with some nifty combinations throughout the bout to pile up the points. (Roderick Osis)