South Africa’s Malcolm Klassen won the IBF junior lightweight title when he beat Gairy St Clair on a split decision in Kempton Park near Johannesburg on Saturday night. Klassen produced a stunning performance to win 118-112 and 117-111 on two cards. The other judge, an Australian, gave it to St Clair, 115-113.

The new champion, given almost no chance by most experts, outgunned the Guyana-born Australian in almost every department.

He showed outstanding hand speed, good balance, probably the best jab in South Africa, all the combinations in the book, concentration and, above all, the courage and confidence to go after the champion for the whole fight.

St Clair, with strength and experienced on his side, was never given the chance to change into his usual buzz-saw mode.

The crowd at Emperor’s Palace saw one of the best fights in recent years in South Africa and one of the best performances in many years by a South African.

Klassen, 25, who now has a record of 19-3-2, with 9 stoppages, came into the bout as a replacement for Cassius Baloyi and had to move up a division to fight the Australia-based St Clair.

To make his victory even more astounding, he had never fought a ranked contender in the junior lightweight division.

He is ranked at No 15 in the featherweight division by the IBF, which qualified him for a crack at the title but fought in a heavier division.

St Clair, whose record dropped to 38-4-2 (17), may have expected an easy fight but the 31-year-old never looked like a man who had fought Diego Corrales, Vivian Harris, Leonard Dorin and Baloyi.

Klassen came in at 58.94 kg and St Clair at 58.76.

In an entertaining undercard bout between two lefthanders, Tanzanian Mbwana Matumla took the vacant IBO junior bantamweight title when he beat Filipino Eric Barcelona on points.

The judges may have been rather generous in scoring it 116-111, 117-110 and 118-109 for Matumla, whose record now stands at 18-2, with 11 stoppages. Barcelona fell to 33-10-5; 10.

Danie Venter’s challenge for the World Boxing Foundation cruiserweight title did not go into the second half of the fight. The champion, Gyorgi Hidvegi of Hungary had the South African out on his feet at the end of the fourth round and sealed a tko win in the sixth when Venter went down from a short right to the ribs and stayed down.

Venter came in at 90.76 kg and Hidvegi at 90.12.

In a junior welterweight clash scheduled for eight round, Banda Mathebula was stopped at 2:27 of the eight round by China’s Zhi Lin Xai

In an all southpaw clash South Africa’s Nkosinathi Joyi 16-0 (12) won the vacant IBO strawweight belt when he knocked out Armando de la Cruz 19-8-1(8) of the Philippines at 1 minute 28 seconds into the second round. After a quiet opening round Joyi (47.42kg) who was up against his first international opponent picked up the pace in the second to score with some stinging jabs before he landed a right-left combination that put De La Cruz (47.32kg) on the seat of his pants where he took the count from referee Phil Austin of Australia.

Fighting in the light heavyweight division South Africa’s Daniel Bruwer (79.10kg) scored a majority points decision over the gutsy Charles Chisamba from Zambia in an entertaining eight rounder.

In a heavyweight contest for the vacant WBF heavyweight belt that finished at 2am in the morning Albert Sosnowski (107.42) of Poland was just too big and strong for Lawrence Tausa (98.36kg) from Samoa, in a hard fought 12 rounder.