With a fight against Errol Spence Jnr on the line, Tim Tszyu triumphed over the previously unbeaten Denis Nurja, winning handily in the main event Sunday at the WIN Entertainment Centre in Wollongong, Australia.
Tszyu dropped Nurja in the fourth round and looked as if he could have put him away within the distance, but Tszyu instead seemed to coast to the final bell.
“I was trying to take him out,” Tszyu said afterward.
It was otherwise understandable that Tszyu was not necessarily looking for a firefight, especially given past results – his stoppage losses to Bakhram Murtazaliev in 2024 and Sebastian Fundora in their 2025 rematch.
While Nurja was undefeated, he also didn’t have dangerous power – only nine knockouts in his 20 wins – nor did he have the boxing ability to stymie Tszyu.
That meant Tszyu could test, in relative safety, what one imagines will be a more defensively responsible approach for when he returns to deeper waters against Spence.
Both men largely worked behind their jabs in the first round and eventually added more to their offensive output. Nurja used his jab to set up a left hook later on in the stanza, while Tszyu soon paired his jab with a right cross.
Nurja continued to fit his jab between Tszyu’s gloves at the start of the second round. Tszyu opted to use his left hand for power, dishing out an uppercut and following it immediately with a hook to the body. Soon, two shots from Tszyu had Nurja stumbling, though that may have been the result of him being off-balance.
Whatever the cause, Tszyu took advantage of the situation and twice maneuvered Nurja to the ropes, where he dug in with a good shot to the body. Nurja, trying to retaliate, broke from his poise and sent out a right hand that missed its target.
Tszyu kicked off the third by getting in range to land power punches. That meant he was in range to receive them as well. Tszyu did eat a right uppercut from Nurja, but there wasn’t enough oomph behind it to trouble him. Tszyu recognized this and began to open up more in the latter half of the round, scoring with one-two combinations as well as solo left hooks to the head.
But Tszyu did take some visible damage. About 55 seconds into the fourth round, an accidental clash of heads opened up a wide cut below Tszyu’s left eye. As ugly as the wound looked, it wasn’t anything like the horrifying gash that Tszyu suffered high on his scalp in the first Fundora fight. This blood wasn’t going to pour into his eyes and obscure his vision. Nor was it bad enough to concern the ringside physician.
Nurja apologized immediately afterward, yet he also wasn’t above targeting the injury with a right hand once action resumed. Tszyu scored the sole knockdown of the bout with about a minute to go in the fourth, landing a hard left hook that sent Nurja downward, adding two rights while Nurja was on his way.
Nurja rose quickly and tried to battle back. Tszyu dodged and tagged Nurja with two right uppercuts, then two left hooks. Nurja was in trouble and had to hold on.
After making it out of the round and getting a minute to rest, Nurja looked steadier at the start of the fifth. Despite the success of the previous round, Tszyu didn’t move into a higher gear to try to force the stoppage. Nor did he seem worried about the potential danger of letting Nurja recover.
Indeed, Nurja landed a left hook in the sixth that may have been his best shot of the night. It didn’t matter. Tszyu absorbed it fine and hurt Nurja with about 15 seconds left in the round with a right to the side of the head.
Tszyu was like a cat that had trapped a mouse and was toying with it rather than putting it out of its misery. Nurja continued to try, but nothing he did made any difference. He couldn’t hurt Tszyu. He couldn’t deter Tszyu. He couldn’t even truly limit the accumulation of punishment he was taking from Tszyu.
To make matters worse, the referee took a point from Nurja in the seventh round for holding. Tszyu hurt Nurja with a left hook to the body in the eighth. He scored with a good right hand upstairs shortly before the bell to end the ninth.
Nurja did go for broke – well, as much as he could – in the 10th and final round, though that left him even more vulnerable. Tszyu sent Nurja’s mouthpiece flying with a big right hand in the waning moments of the match. But the bout went to the scorecards, with Tszyu scoring his second straight shutout. All three judges had it 100-88.
The CompuBox statistics were just as dominant. Tszyu landed 236 of 573 overall, including 155 of 323 power shots. Nurja, meanwhile, was 94 of 380 overall, including 59 of 199 power shots.
Tszyu-Nurja was contested at a contractual catchweight of 157lbs; each came in comfortably within that limit. It’s likely that Tszyu-Spence will take place somewhere around junior middleweight.
And of course there’s a big difference between beating the likes of Nurja and the 18-0-1 Anthony Velazquez, and taking on someone as talented as Spence showed himself to be during his time unifying three world titles in the welterweight division.
Then again, the 36-year-old Spence, 28-1 (22 KOs), hasn’t fought since getting demolished in his undisputed championship match with Terence Crawford in July 2023.
It’s not that Tszyu is in his best form anymore, either. His reign with the WBO junior middleweight title ended in March 2024 via split decision in a bloody battle with Fundora.
That was followed by Tszyu getting pummeled for three rounds by then-IBF titleholder Murtazaliev in October 2024. Tszyu rebounded by stopping Joey Spencer in April 2025 and then met Fundora in their rematch this past July.
The sequel was far less competitive than the original, with Tszyu remaining on his stool after seven rounds. And so the rebuilding began again last December, when Tszyu shut out Velazquez.
This victory over Nurja brought Tszyu, a 31-year-old from Sydney, Australia, to 27-3 (18 KOs). Nurja, a 31-year-old from Albania, is now 20-1 (9 KOs).
David Greisman, who has covered boxing since 2004, is on Twitter @FightingWords2. David’s book, “Fighting Words: The Heart and Heartbreak of Boxing,” is available on Amazon.
