Jason Moloney will put to the test what he has learned from the harshest lesson of his career when on Thursday he fights Andre Donovan.
The Australian is continuing to rebuild following the defeat in May 2024 by Yoshiki Takei with which he sacrificed the WBO bantamweight title, and at Brisbane’s Fortitude Music Hall hopes to edge closer to a fight with the IBF champion Jose Salas Reyes.
Moloney, partly as a consequence of the uncertainty surrounding the career of Jai Opetaia, is the headline attraction of promoter Tasman Fighters’ second date with the influential Australian broadcaster Stan.
It is little secret that Tasman’s agreement with Stan was reached because of Opetaia’s status as Australia’s leading fighter, but the cruiserweight reaching a co-promotional agreement with Zuffa Boxing in the aftermath of December’s victory over Huseyin Cinkara has presented the 35-year-old Moloney with a higher-profile opportunity to rebuild.
It was on the undercard of Opetaia-Cinkara that Moloney defeated Herlan Gomez, when he experimented with not studying his opponent in an attempt to see if doing so would mean that his performance would improve. Moloney later concluded that it did and has since revealed that he was continuing to learn from the night of his defeat by Takei, when the extent to which he studied his Japanese challenger left him struggling to adjust.
“I went into that fight with a real idea in my head of how I wanted the fight to go and how I wanted to fight, and a real structured game plan I worked on in sparring, and it didn’t work, and because I was so invested in the game plan and cemented so much thought into it in preparation, I wasn’t able to adapt,” he explained to BoxingScene. “The last round I was probably 10 seconds away from knocking him out, and at the end of the fight still felt like I had so much left in the tank.
“I was so disappointed that I said to myself at the end of the fight, ‘If I never watched him and went in there like an amateur tournament, I would have beaten him’. I stuffed up myself with my own mental preparation and over-analysing. It was a lesson learned. Even with the Tenshin [Nasukawa] fight I studied him, and I probably improved a bit on that performance, but still felt like I sat back and respected him too much. Enough of that now – I’m just going to go in there and focus on myself. I really believe that if I’m at my best I can beat all these guys.
“I didn’t see much of my opponent at all, going into the last fight, and I felt like it worked. I just focused on myself; my own preparation; bringing my best to the ring and fighting to my strengths. I’m not worrying too much about what he brings to the table – there’s not much footage available so I’ve been forced to focus on myself. But given that it worked so well the last fight, I think it suits me, and that’s been a positive. People might worry about that, but even if there was footage I wouldn’t really watch it. Don’t worry about what they’re gonna do on fight night; don’t get too caught up in the game plan and his strengths or weaknesses. Take the fight as it comes; be present; be in the moment, and adapt on the fly.
“It is [painful], and it doesn’t get any easier ’cause in this sport a loss is such a setback. I was where I wanted to be my whole life – I was world champion and the world was my oyster, and you have one bad performance and you lose your title, and I’ve spent years clawing myself back to the top and I’m still not where I wanna be. It’s been such a grind.”
Donovan, of New Philadelphia, Ohio, is undefeated in his past 10 contests having lost two of his first three. He has also never previously fought outside of the U.S.
“He’s pretty unknown,” Moloney said. “I really don’t know how good of a fighter he is. Sometimes that’s a dangerous fighter. No doubt he’s looking at this as a massive opportunity to come over here and take on someone with a name – a former world champion – and put him in the spotlight. I haven’t been able to see too much footage; I don’t think many of his fights have been televised; there hasn’t been much study I can do on him. I believe that if I’m at my best I can beat anyone in the division, so as long as I’m at my best – that’s all I need to worry about.
“He’s a southpaw. He looks fairly strong, and he’s a pretty rough, rugged sort of style. He’s the sort of opponent that can give people a hard time if you don’t fight the right fight. I’m not going to get dragged into a dogfight.
“I don’t think there’s anything he can possibly bring to the table that I haven’t seen before, given my experience. I’ve tried to make sure I’ve got all bases covered; whatever he brings I’ll be able to adapt to on the night.”
In many respects more significant to Moloney than his opponent is the platform he is about to embrace. He was well supported on the undercard of Opetaia-Cinkara – the fight was his first in his home country for three years – and if Opetaia is to continue to fight out of the U.S., then Moloney can become a more valuable asset for both Tasman and Stan.
“That’s why it felt so good to sign with Tasman and get a fight back in Australia; to be given the opportunity to resurrect my career,” he said. “It wasn’t a world title fight or anything, but I really enjoyed it. It was my first fight in Australia in quite a few years. It felt good to walk into a crowd with a lot of my friends and family in support, and on the road back. This is the same – another step forward. It’s the first show I’ve headlined since my fight with [in 2020, Naoya] Inoue. I’ve given my life to this sport – I don’t want to be an undercard fighter. I want to be involved in the big fights. It’s a real privilege to headline. It feels good to be in this position.
“It’s a really, really exciting opportunity. The hardcore fans maybe appreciate that I was a road warrior and won a world title on the road, but I really haven’t had the opportunity to build my profile that much in Australia. I’m far, far from a household name. This opportunity where I’m headlining on Stan – it’s a big deal. There’ll be a lot of new eyes on me that haven’t seen me fight before.”
