Andre Ward is a good fighter, he might even be very good, but he is not "great" as yet.
He has good wins, but he has faced no great Variety of styles.
Mikkel Kessler, good win, albeit in his back yard and involving several headbutts. Kessler is a good fighter, but if you can negate his jab and avoid his straight shots he is simple to de-construct.
Allen Green, another good performance, totally outworked and outhustled Green who is a big puncher, though very limited. For me it's a big minus that despite his dominance, Ward never looked like getting the notoriously fragile Green out of there.
Arthur Abraham, Arthur was too small to compete at 168lbs any-more, his confidence was also shot from the beatings he took from Dirrell and Froch. Ward did what he had to in outpointing Ward, but it's not a great win by that stage.
Carl Froch, another good win, similar to Kessler. Although i saw this as not the best performance, Froch's worst night where he started ridiculously slowly and was far too wide with his shots, still Ward got the job done.
As you can see, Ward has done pretty well against some good fighters, however he has only fought "away" from home one time, and that was still in America, he has also never fought a quick fighter, all of them have been limited in their own way.
Going into the Dawson fight we will really find out what Ward has, an I for one see it as a 50-50 fight that could go either way.
Conclusion:
Andre Ward is good, but not yet great.
He has good wins, but he has faced no great Variety of styles.
Mikkel Kessler, good win, albeit in his back yard and involving several headbutts. Kessler is a good fighter, but if you can negate his jab and avoid his straight shots he is simple to de-construct.
Allen Green, another good performance, totally outworked and outhustled Green who is a big puncher, though very limited. For me it's a big minus that despite his dominance, Ward never looked like getting the notoriously fragile Green out of there.
Arthur Abraham, Arthur was too small to compete at 168lbs any-more, his confidence was also shot from the beatings he took from Dirrell and Froch. Ward did what he had to in outpointing Ward, but it's not a great win by that stage.
Carl Froch, another good win, similar to Kessler. Although i saw this as not the best performance, Froch's worst night where he started ridiculously slowly and was far too wide with his shots, still Ward got the job done.
As you can see, Ward has done pretty well against some good fighters, however he has only fought "away" from home one time, and that was still in America, he has also never fought a quick fighter, all of them have been limited in their own way.
Going into the Dawson fight we will really find out what Ward has, an I for one see it as a 50-50 fight that could go either way.
Conclusion:
Andre Ward is good, but not yet great.
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