When Ward clearly beats Kovalev in Nov what will be the top excuses by detractors

[joe strong]

I think Ward will win this fight by UD & he will make it look easy. You can bet he will throw a head butt or 2. Evander Holyfield did it all the time. If you can get away with it then why not? That's how Holyfield beat guys who were bigger. He would get them out of their game plan. Ward does the same but he is an excellent boxer so he can disguise it well. I think Kovalev will need to keep his cool & be prepared for it because he will get butted. If he loses his cool when it happens then it's all over for him. Say what you want about Ward but he is one of the best in my generation. I don't like his style but he gets it done...

[Madison Boxing]

You can tell you have never been in a boxing ring, you sound like a 12 year old. Because when you have been in there, you just don't think like that. You might think the other guy was bending the rules and makes the most of what he can get away with, but ultimately it is up to you to use what you know to counteract what the other guy is doing.

Ricky Hatton beat a lot of guys by getting off his own shots and combinations and then falling in holding, stealing a rest, and repeating again. The first time I saw him, I thought "Wow, this is going to be a hard guy to beat". His style created a number of issues for fighters, namely he was on them so quick, he closed the distance but he had a natural defence mechanism and style which stopped guys from getting their own shots off, they had to catch him coming in but it was an extremely small window. It took Floyd ****ing Mayweather to finally beat him, and so my point is if Kovalev is good enough he will find a way. Kessler wasn't good enough, he wasn't versatile enough, he could only fight at one distance and that was his main problem against Ward and Calzaghe.

Boxing has been littered with fighters who bend the rules and stretch the limits of the rules, you wouldn't be surprised to know that lots of those guys are HOF'ers and ATG's. If you look at the sheer amount of clinching Ali does in his fights with Frazier for example - you would probably be surprised. Wladimir Klitschko...enough said I think. Sweet Pea, Naseem Hamed, were constantly bending below the waist, but to be honest there is something to be said to be athletic enough to do that in a effective way...I could go on forever.

Bottom line...you need to get over it. Lets watch the fight - and hope for a good fight, may the best man win.

first of all I have been in a boxing ring and why would that matter one bit anyway? It isn't up to the opponent to counteract it, if it was then we should get rid of refs altogether. Fighters are there to dodge punches, not dodge headbutts ffs. he clinched Kessler 88 times and headbutted 5 times.