Despite showing ring rust, SA junior middleweight champion Shervontaigh Koopman, who had not fought for over a year, used his superior skills effectively to outsmart Jackson Kaptein and eventually send him to slumberland in the eighth round at Emperors Palace on Saturday night.

The champion recorded the first defence of the belt he won in 2021. Koopman, who knocked out Jamie Webb in the fifth round on March 6 last year to retain the IBF Continental Africa title, boxed from memory...