Lloyd Honeyghan, blimey. I remember watching that fight through a shop window in Huddersfield. He made a few successful defences of his smash and grab title. And then…. He got the hiding of his life from a yank called Marlon Starling. Oooft… that brought him down to earth with a bump…
I must admit I don't recall this fight but Lloyd was well beaten by the better boxer. I think he made the fatal mistake of believing his own all guns blazing hype. He just didn't know how, or appear to have the skills, to counter him at any stage. A cracking fight mind & a brave tough performance to last as long as he did. A cracking vid also what with Harry Carpenter, comments from Tyson & that ref who looks like Robert Duvall...
A low blow is any punch which lands below the waistline, which is taken to be the belly button as the muscle below that line is very thin and prone to herniation. I can vouch for that because in June I picked up a tear of some sort in that area while playing cricket and it’s still giving me jip.
I remember Starling as a very skilled fighter. Great timing and movement. He reminded me of our own Michael Watson (sustained horrific injuries against Chris Eubank).
And now it is on we start to think of predictions for the fight... It's easy to say well Fury has got this in the bag but... Usyk is no mug and is by all account a highly technical boxer with great footwork, fast hands & defensive abilities. He's also a southpaw. Fury can be just as difficult but in a more er... artisan manner and has been known to swap stance mid fight so he knows his way around the ring. He hasn't fought for a year now. Like Usyk he's not really a one punch KO man and both men haven't really fought anyone of great note in the past couple of years either. So I reckon it'll be an intriguing fight as to the tactics involved. Will Fury come out like he did against Wilder and stamp his authority early or will it be cagey throughout with each looking to find the others' weakness. I've still gotta go with Fury though as he's the bigger man and a real fighter with his back to the wall.
If he keeps his head straight, it’s got to be Fury. He’s too big for Usyk. He’s got great movement, in fact they both do. I don’t think Usyk’s got the power to put Fury away and I can’t see Usyk boxing Fury’s ears off like he did with AJ. That said, Fury’s condition looks bloody awful at the moment. Dunno if he’s having another episode with the beer but he’s got to despatch Ngannou yet. No mean feat… I was thinking about this. There’s gonna be a shed load of cash on the Fury Usyk fight. Can you imagine the uproar if Ngannou flattens Fury? I couldn’t help thinking Ngannou will be getting ‘instructions’ inside a rather thick brown envelope.. I watched Caroline Dubois last night fighting the Mexican lass (can’t remember her name). That was a great fight! Dubois was good but didn’t have it all her own way. Mexicans always give a good account of themselves in a scrap and last night was no exception.
Fury looked an absolute mess at the face off recently, but having said that, he looked in similar shape for his last fight and didn’t have any problems. I get the feeling he’s not taking Ngannou seriously, but then did you see the open workout video Ngannou posted? Maybe he was sandbagging and trying to lull Fury into a false sense of security, but it was pretty embarrassing, as if he was still learning the basics. https://bloodyelbow.com/2023/09/29/francis-ngannou-open-workout-mocked/ I also think Fury will be too much for Usyk, but I also have a sneaking suspicion that the fight won’t go ahead. I reckon Fury is losing interest in boxing (again), he won’t put in the work to get into the sort of shape he will need to be in in order to deal with someone of Usyk’s quality and he’s also worried about his legacy if Usyk beats him. Therefore, I predict he will suffer a rib or hand injury sometime around the beginning of December…..
If fury loses to Ngannou then he has no business being in the ring with Usyk anyway. It wouldn't surprise if the match with Ngannou was arranged after a tacit agreement was made with Usyk and Fury will use it as way of clearing the ring rust from his system. I have no idea if he's is a southpaw but being an MMA fighter I suspect he punches from all sorts of angles like Usyk so should make a good practice bout as well. And who knows with Fury what his mental state is... perhaps his weight is also sandbagging & a ruse to get people to look the other way. As Ruiz showed weight can & does help with punching power. And this is why we like sport... anything can, & often does happen
Cheriiist, Fury looks at medical crisis point with all that midriff fat. Looks bloody awful You do wonder if he’s up for it after all the Netflix success. He insists the fight game is all he knows and lives for and I don’t disbelieve this. But I haven’t seen those eyes since Wilder II (the bell for round one). That was the face of a very determined man
I end up passive watching quite a lot of MMA as my son is really into it and even when the fighters are punchers rather than grapplers it’s very different to boxing. The bouts are 3 or 5 x 5 min rounds, they fight at a greater distance because of the kicking, they probably only receive about a quarter of the blows per round that a boxer would expect to deal with, body shots aren’t really a thing and the very small gloves mean that a lot of punches don’t land cleanly. I’ve seen a few of Ngannou’s fights and he has plenty of power but he’s a bit of a swinger who tends to catch his opponents with a haymaker as they come charging in, and Fury is far too canny for that.
Another thing worth noting about the Fury v Ngannou fight is that even You Tube boxers tend to beat MMA guys in boxing matches. It’s true that most of them tend to be retired fighters doing it for the cash, but these guys are no mugs. Just last month, the still actively competing Nate Diaz got beaten by Jake Paul, and Nate is known for being a toe to toe striker with a seemingly limitless capacity to absorb punishment and just relentlessly keep going (my son once quipped that it must be like fighting a zombie). Yet despite being a really scary dude, he got schooled by a guy who, although he’s probably the pick of the You Tube boxers, is still an absolute newbie. Ngannou, on the other hand, is getting in the ring with (IMO) the best heavyweight since Lennox Lewis.
McGregor v Mayweather kicked all this money spinning stuff off IIRC. I remember the boxing world being a tad uneasy about it all. Tommy Fury and co do make me smile when they dismiss opponents as ‘just a YouTuber’ YouTuber or no YouTuber if they’re good enough and they train properly they will do the business in the ring.
Well, seeing as Jake Paul went the distance with Tommy who, although he was clearly the winner, looked far from convincing, that sort of dismissiveness doesn't carry much weight.
I'm assuming the boxing authorities arrange these fights because they are looking to get back the young audience they have lost to MMA. How do the MMA/youtubers get their licence to box? And it's not as though Tommy is a class act in the ring himself...
