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Close fight. hope Kessler pulls through
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I don't see Ward taking this, he may start well but Kessler will break him.Comment
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Do it for the Stars and Stripes, DRE!!
The Next American Hero!!
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****ing prima donna. Kessler KO 1.Comment
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I think people read too much into the nationality issue in the Super Six.
I can understand a boxer having patriotism, of course, it's just that I think people seem to see this tournament as Team USA vs Team Europe. Obviously they've scheduled the first round that way, but it'll all go out of the window soon enough when Kessler-Froch and Ward-Taylor happen.
I don't mean any of the above as a criticism of the article, by the way. Just a general viewpoint.
Good luck to both guys, I think it'll be a close one tomorrow (with the championship rounds being key) and I wouldn't be surprised if they end up having a rematch as the final.Comment
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I like both of them so may the best man win. Hopefully it turns out to be a great fight.....I like this article about this fight
KESSLER vs WARD
"Once the United States ruled boxing’s heavier weight divisions.Those days are just a fading memory. Showtime’s Super Six tournament in the 168-pound division has demonstrated the rise of European fighters. Undefeated Olympic bronze medallist Andre Dirrell lost a split decision to Carl Froch in the U.K., former middleweight champion Jermain Taylor, another Olympic bronze medallist, was knocked spark out in the closing seconds of his fight with Arthur Abraham in Germany and his career is in doubt. Will it be more of the same in the closing stage of the tournament’s opening-bracket bouts when Andre Ward, the Olympic gold medallist, challenges Denmark’s WBA champion Mikkel Kessler in Ward’s hometown of Oakland, CA, on Saturday?
A pattern was set in the first two tournament bouts. The American boxers were faster and flashier, the Europeans stronger, tougher and more powerful.
Kessler is seen as stronger than Ward, tougher, more seasoned and a better puncher. On top of all this, Kessler is an excellent technician, fundamentally solid. He is the sort of fighter who doesn’t make many mistakes, and he has shown that he can stop an opponent early or late in a contest.
This is a daunting task for Ward. He has never fought at anything like this level. Ward has the home ground advantage but this will not worry the ice-cool Scandinavian boxer, who dominated Anthony Mundine in Australia, won by KO in Germany and fought honourably against Joe Calzaghe in front of a huge, hostile Welsh crowd — and did so with an injured right hand.
There is a widespread feeling in boxing circles that Ward is out of his depth, that he will not be able to keep Kessler at bay for 12 rounds.
We have just had one of the American boxers not just knocked out but perhaps knocked out of boxing. I believe the unspoken concern behind the Super Six scenes is that Ward loses this fight badly. If he does, if heaven forbid, he is embarrassed in this fight, the tournament, which attracted such favourable comment when it was launched, will have taken a heavy hit. It was bad enough that Taylor crashed heavily in Berlin; the tournament can do without something similar happening in Oakland, which is hosting its first world title bout since Jimmy Ellis outpointed Jerry Quarry in an unexciting heavyweight fight in 1968.
There will be a lot of weight on Ward’s muscular shoulders, then, when he enters the ring on Saturday.
Yet as tough as the task will be, it is not as if Ward doesn’t stand a chance. Ward, 25, hasn’t lost since he was a 12-year-old. He upset the odds in the Olympics when he outscored Russia’s towering world champion, Makarenko, on his way to the gold medal. He is fast, athletic, skilful and smart — and he is unbeaten, which means that we don’t know what his level is until he reaches it.
The critics will tell you that Ward has a suspect chin and isn't battle-hardened, with the implication that he won’t be able to stand up to the sort of pressure he will face on Saturday.
I’m not so sure about this. I was able to talk with Ward at a breakfast meeting with media in Las Vegas earlier this year and I came away impressed. What Ward will you is that he's tougher than people realise but that he boxes to win, not to prove his toughness.
No, he has never met anyone as formidable as Kessler, but he did box 12 rounds against a heavy-handed fighter when he outscored Edison Miranda in May, and he did so despite getting cut over the eye in the opening round. I thought that Ward showed some character in that fight.
Ward had a couple of shaky moments in his first year as a professional boxer when journeyman Kenny Kost wobbled him with a left hook and trial horse Darnell Boone knocked him down, but he rallied to win and he has never looked back, hardly losing a round in subsequent fights.
Kessler has an extremely sturdy chin, but his knees buckled when Dimitri Sartison nailed him with a right hand in the opening round of their fight in June 2008, and Calzaghe briefly had him wilting from a body shot. There is no doubt that Kessler is the puncher in Saturday’s fight, but I believe that Ward is capable of inflicting hurt, too.
Ward’s trainer and godfather, Virgil Hunter, told me in a phone conversation that Ward won’t be running. The plan is to fight as well as box, to test Kessler to the body, to try to make the champion fight at a faster pace than he wants to fight at — and, most important of all, to disrupt the machinelike efficiency of the more seasoned man.
Kessler has an unsettling confidence — he has the look of a man who feels he cannot lose — but Ward seems to draw strength from his spiritual faith and I do get the feeling that the American boxer has a sense of destiny, a belief that greatness is in his grasp.
There is a risk that Kessler, 30, will prove too much for Ward, walk him down and weaken him to the point where the fight has to be stopped. Yet a boxer such as Ward, with his speed, switches to southpaw and constant movement, just might be able to offset the organised advance of the excellent Danish fighter.
The early rounds often tell us a great deal about the ultimate outcome of a fight, and this one is no exception. If Ward can stand up to Kessler early, refuse to be bullied and get his opponent’s respect, we will know he is with a real chance. If, however, Kessler immediately starts to dictate the terms of engagement then Ward’s hopes of victory will be slim.
Ward, I believe, has to get into the fight from the start and hopefully win some rounds to give himself something he can build on — something to sustain him for the ordeal of the later rounds.
There is a quiet confidence in the Ward camp. Virgil Hunter tells me he feels that Kessler will be surprised by Ward’s strength and how hard the younger man punches. “I guarantee you that Kessler will not be the stronger man in the ring,” Hunter told me.
Looking at this fight with cold logic, Kessler will be the winner. In boxing, though, the logical doesn't always happen.
“Andre hasn’t yet fought the fight that he needs to fight to beat Kessler,” Hunter told me, “but I know it’s in him."
I, too, think that it’s in him.
I’m going to swim against the current on this one with a lean towards Ward finding the way to box, move and fight his way through 12 rounds and emerge with the win in this, the most difficult and dangerous fight of his life".Comment
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