Thompson not impressed with Wladimir’s win over Mormeck

By Boxing News - 03/05/2012 - Comments

Image: Thompson not impressed with Wladimir's win over MormeckBy Allan Fox: Heavyweight contender Tony Thompson (36-2, 24 KO’s) didn’t see anything in IBF/WBA/WBO heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko’s performance against Jean Mormeck last Saturday night that impressed him in the slightest. Wladimir, 35, stopped the short 5’11” Mormeck in the 4th round, limiting him to only four punches landed in their fight in front of 50,000+ fans at the ESPRIT arena, in Düsseldorf, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany.

Thompson said “I wasn’t really impressed with either performance. It was an infomercial at best. Mormeck is a tough cruiserweight but he’s not an impressive opponent for the heavyweight champion of the world.”

The reason why the 40-year-old Thompson is someone worthy of discussion about his personal opinions is because he’s likely to be Wladimir’s next title challenger unless he’s given a step aside fee or Wladimir opts to vacate his IBF title. Thompson is Wladimir’s International Boxing Federation mandatory challenger and he’s due for his title shot. It looks like Wladimir is going to give him the shot now rather than giving up his title or paying him a step aside fee.

It’s probably not going to make for thrilling action unfortunately because Thompson was already beaten by Wladimir in an 11th round TKO loss in 2008, and in a non-competitive fight. Now four years later, I suspect Thompson will do a lot worse this time because he’s visibly slower than he was back then and hasn’t developed any power since that time to make him anymore of a threat than he was back then. The 6’5″ southpaw Thompson is still a much better opponent for Wladimir compared to Mormeck.

Thompson landed more shots against Wladimir than any other heavyweight has since his fight against Samuel Peter. However, that was mostly due to Wladimir fighting so cautiously. He really didn’t fight with any fire in that bout until the 11th round when he blasted Thompson to the canvas with a flurry of shots.

At the time Wladimir fought Thompson, he still seemed to be haunted by his losses to Corrie Sander and Lamon Brewster and didn’t fight hard. His trainer Emanuel Steward was finally able to motivate Wladimir to go for the KO in the 11th and he did well. In a rematch, Steward will likely have Wladimir go after Thompson much earlier in the fight to product a quick knockout. He can’t let Thompson hang around because he’s able to connect due to his long arms and almost equal height and reach.



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