[Rocco Del Sesto]

01/07/67 Saturday

Belgrade, Yugoslavia
Albert Duscha – LHW (11-17-7) vs. Yvan Prebeg – LHW (14-11-3)


Albert Duscha - Germany Rating 1
Light Heavyweight 1955-68

12 wins / 20 losses / 9 draws / 2 KO

Hometown/Birthplace: Herne, Germany

Rating by: Rocco Del Sesto

Not much of puncher with only 2 KO's in 41 fights. A so so chin with 7 stoppages of Duscha in his career. He beat Jose Peyre early in an 8 round decision early in each of thier careers. He was KO'd in 2 by Uwe Janssen, lost an 8 round decision in Mariano Echevarria's first career fight in 1957.

In 1963-64 he beat Frankie Daniels, was stopped by Ray Patterson in 4 rounds, lost a 10 round decision to Wim Snoek, then drew 10 rounds with Yvan Prebeg and stopped Snoek in 7 rounds. That all led up a shot for the German Light Heavyweight Title in November 1964 against Klaus Peter Gumpert(24-2-4,12KO). Gumpert stopped Duscha in the 7th round.

Duscha fought about 3-1/2 more years but with little success going only 2-7-5 the rest of the way. His only success were 6 round decisions over a Klaus Langhammer(16-19-9) and against Burghard Lembke(4-20-0) in his last career fight. He managed draws with Karl-Heinz Guder(25-20-5) and Rudolf Nehring(28-21-11). In January 1967 he lost a 10 round decision in a rematch with Yvan Prebeg who was about half way through his career and was actually approaching an upswing in success in his career that would see him go 17-1-1 during the late 60's.

Yvan Prebeg - Croatia Rating 2
Light Heavyweight 1961-71

31 wins / 15 losses / 5 draws / 22 KO

Hometown: Zagreb, Croatia(Hrvatska)
Birthplace: Josipdol

Rated by: Rocco Del Sesto

Prebeg fought the majority of his fights in the Light Heavyweight division, but fought a number of Heavyweight bouts throughout his career. A small sprinkling of middleweight opponents were thrown in. His record against Heavyweights was 11-6-2 with 7KO's. Against LH's and the MW's it was 20-9-3,15KO.

He fought only a couple of pretty good LHW's out of the game, Pekka Kokkonen whom he lost to by 4th round KO, and Piero Del Papa who decisioned Prebeg in 15 rounds to who he lost the European LH Title to in Feb. 1970 after having attained that crown in June 1969 against Eddie Avoth. Others that he's fought are Lion Ven, Yao Kouame, Paul Roux, Albert Duscha, Moussa Sangaree, Ireno Werleman and Victor Chapelle.

Heavyweights he fought included wins against Buddy Turman, another busy journeyman in the 50's-60's who fought a few "name" HW's, Dave Bailey,Jose Peyre, and Mariano Echevarria. Some that he lost against, Jack Bodell, Jurgen Blin and Karl Mildenberger with whom he battled 15 rounds for the European HW Title in June 1966 only to loose by decision to Karl.


The fight......

Two fighters who careers were going in definite opposite directions. Duscha from Germany was reaching the tail end of his career that was in the mist of a 2-7-5 record over the last part of it. For Prebeg he was just starting to reach the peak of his career. His record stood at 13-9-3 when he’d fought Karl Mildenberger about 7 months earlier for the European Heavyweight Title, loosing a 15 round decision to Karl. After that Prebeg, apparently not recovered maybe physically and mentally from his bout with Mildenberger, was shocked in a 7th round TKO loss to Moussa Sanagree. He then managed to come back a couple months later to defeat a Daniel Leullier, to set up his bout here with Duscha. In 1967, Duscha gave Prebeg a real fight, going the 10 round distance, but Prebeg pulled out the decision win, thus giving him the first 2 wins in a 17-1-1 streak over the next 3 years that would include winning the European LHW Title in 1969.
Our replay fight here was an entertaining one with a lot of good back and forth action. It was a very close fight on the scorecards until lightening struck in the 7th round! The Scoring through the first 6 rounds had it 57-57 by judges 1 and 2 with Judge 3 having it 58-56 Duscha. Round 1 was the difference in the judging. Judges 1 and 2 had it Prebeg, while judge 3 had it Duscha. Duscha strikes first with some hard jabs, but I just don’t see it being Duscha’s round as Prebeg counters with some jabs and hooks that I feel clearly outscores what Duscha managed. Round 2 all three scored it Prebeg. A few punches were landed each way, but was Prebeg’s round. In round 3, was a lot of dancing around and blocking punches when late, Duscha landed a quick hook and then fires a jab that finds it mark and it ends in the books as Duscha’s round on all cards. Round 4 had a lot of good action back and forth between the two fighters with the judges scoring it 10-10. Then in the 5th round, Prebeg began to really press the action inside a couple minutes into the round with it being a standoff again it looked. Suddenly a jab, a cross and then a little uppercut find their marks but, Duscha steps out of complaining to the referee and the referee has an ear for Duscha’s complaints as he issues a warning to Prebeg for holding and hitting! After the fight is momentarily stopped by the referee issuing the warning, Duscha steps in with a hook, but Prebeg blocks it an Yvan counters with a nice hook of his own that finds the mark! The points clearly go to Prebeg in this round but he looses a point on the scorecards with those warnings and it ends a 9-9 tie on all the judges cards. The 6th round then starts and about a ½ minute in, Duscha suddenly lands a solid jab that drops Prebeg! He gets up though on the 6 count. Prebeg takes his time avoiding Duscha then to recover himself then late takes the action back in to land a good uppercut to ends the round at least a close 10-9 in Duscha’s favor. Prebeg knows though he’s got a close fight on his hands with the judges and he’s got to press the action hard to pull this out.
The 7th round starts you can tell that Duscha is starting to tire though as his hands are starting to drop and that can spell trouble fast! Duscha manages to rip a hook to the head, then Yvan counters with a straight jab that splits Duscha’s gloves. The fighters are trading shots, but Prebeg seems to be winning the exchange when he suddenly lands a hard cross that decks Duscha! Albert manages to get up in 8, but it’s clear he’s in trouble! The referee waives the two fighters together, then Duscha absorbs a wicked jab to the head and he staggers backward and goes down again in a heap! This time Duscha manages to get up again by the 9th count. Prebeg quickly gets Duscha back on the ropes. Can he finish this! Prebeg throws a leaping shot that misses the mark but then lands another crushing Jab! Albert is stopped in his tracks by that shot! Prebeg motions for the referee to stop the fight….and he’s going to do it! The fight is stopped at the 2:37 mark for a 7th round TKO victory for Yvan Prebeg!!

I would say the most entertaining fight yet of my 67 replay! One thing I want to note. I’d adjusted Prebeg’s ratings before this fight. I’d rated Yvan sometime earlier in this HH fighters thread, having given him split ratings of a 1 for HW and 4 for LHW. I went back and looked at him again strictly as a LHW rating against the variety of HW and LHW opponents he face. With a better selection of the kinds of opponents he faced I came up with a downgraded 2 rating for him as a LHW. Main difference being a little better control rating and little more HP but weakened his chin some which I felt needed to be. Overall I feel a little more satisfied with Prebeg’s rating now as a LHW.