At the Fantasy Springs Casino, in Indio, CA, Thursday night over ESPN2 with Golden Boy Promotions headlining with former WBC World Super Featherweight champion Mexican Francisco “El Bandido” Vargas and a six bout undercard.

Former Super Featherweight WBC champion “El Bandido” Francisco Vargas, 25-1-2 (18), of Mexico City, MEX, stopped “Lightning” Rod Salka, 24-5 (4), of Lenola, PA, after six rounds of a scheduled 10.

In the first round Salka is moving well using his jab until he got caught with a combination from Vargas to the head. Vargas landed several big rights to the head on two different occasions catching the back pedaling Salka. Salka doesn’t seem to have the power to match Vargas. In the second round Vargas had Salka holding on after a flurry of punches. Vargas landed three left hooks to the body of Salka putting him against the ropes. Salka lands right hands to the head of Vargas that seem to have little effect.

In the third round Vargas continues putting pressure on Salka driving him around the ring. Salka gets in several right hands to the chin but too few to win the round. Salka’s left eye started to show swelling. Vargas makes Salka hold on forcing the referee Jerry Chantu to pull them apart. In the fourth round Vargas continues to land the harder punches as Salka’a punches seem to be more of a slapping nature. Salka’s jab is not holding off Vargas who keeps throwing the harder ones.

In the fifth round Salka seems to be in the survival mode as Vargas is making the right side of Salka’s face looking bad from left hooks. Vargas rocks Salka with a combination to the head. Vargas drives Salka back and lands a pair of right uppercuts to the chin dropping Salka to the canvas. In the sixth round Vargas continues landing leather on Salka whose return punches have little on them. Salka has a welt under his left eye. Its evident Salka is not in the same class as Vargas. Salka’s corner wisely doesn’t allow him to come out for the seventh round.

In the co-feature Aidar Sharibayev, 7-1 (6), of KAZ out of Miami, FL, lost for the first time being stopped by veteran Andrew “El Chango” Cancio, 18-4-2 (14), of Blythe, CA, at 0:43 of the tenth round for the vacant WBA Inter-Continental Super Featherweight Title over 10 rounds.

In the first round Sharibayev is forcing the action but catching several left hooks to the head from Cancio. The taller Cancio is landing a flurry of punches when in the middle of the ring. Cancio landed a lead right to the head of Sharibayev with seconds left in the round. In the second round Sharibayev got back into the fight with some good body work. Both fighters were mixing it up at the bell.

In the third round Cancio is still sticking to head shots while Sharibayev is going to the body and head. A combination with the right landing on the chin of Cancio knocked him back several steps. Sharibayev dropped his hands to his side and got hit with a left hook on the chin and down face first trying to grab the ankles of Cancio while falling to the canvas. He just beat the count of referee Raul Caiz, Sr. In the fourth round both fighters are landing well with no let up. Cancio landed a solid left hook to the head of Sharibayev who again is trying to move around the ring but lets his defense down and pays the price.

In the fifth round they pick up where they left off both throwing punches with Sharibayev landed a big left hook to the head of Cancio. Sharibayev again is dropping his hands to his side and down he went from a right to the head from Cancio with half a minute left in the round. Sharibayev started running to get through the round. When the bell sounded Sharibayev landed a pair of body shots and got warned from referee Caiz, Sr.

In round six it was more of the same with Cancio outworking Sharibayev who can’t seem to hurt Cancio whose bottom lip was cut. In round seven Cancio continued our landing Sharibayev rocking him with a right hand to the chin.

In the eighth round Cancio continued pushing Sharibayev halfway through the round before Sharibayev started landing well backing up Cancio. In the ninth round Sharibayev continues to back up Cancio catching a solid punch or two in return from Cancio. A chopping right from Cancio on the head of a ducking Sharibayev hurt. Cancio followed up chasing Sharibayev landing with a left hook to the body doubling him over. In the tenth and final round Cancio rocked Sharibayev with a right to the chin backing him up. He continued ripping into him forcing the corner of Sharibayev to throw in the towel.

Super Lightweight Jonathan “Thunder” Navarro, 14-0 (7), of East Los Angeles, CA, defeated Justin “The Vodou” Savi, of Benin, out of Silver Spring, MD, over 8 rounds.

Lightweight Genaro “El Conde” Gamez, 8-0 (5), of San Diego, CA, defeated Shoki “EL PV” Sakai, 23-9-2 (13), of Japan out of Mexico City, MEX, over 8 rounds.

Featherweight Javier Padilla, 6-0-1 (5), of Rancho Mirage, CA, defeated Ricardo Arias, 1-3-1 (0), of Mexico City, MEX, over 4 rounds.

Local Super Featherweight Rommel Caballero, 0-0-1 (0), of Coachella, CA, and Mexican Eric Rodriguez, 1-2-1 (0), of Los Angeles, CA, ended in a technical draw after one round of a 4 due to a cut to Rodriguez.

In the first round Caballero is using a jab and following with right hand as Rodriguez counters with left hooks. A clash of heads opened up a bad cut over the left eye of Rodriguez. Referee Wayne Hedgepeth ruled the cut was caused from a clash of heads. The corner of Rodriguez refused to let him continue due to lack of vision in the left eye.

Super Welterweight Aaron McKenna, 3-0-1 (2), of Ireland out of Los Angeles, CA, knocked out Keasen Freeman, 4-2 (2), of Aiken, SC, at 2:06 of the first round of a scheduled 4.