By Allan Fox: Former WBA heavyweight champion Alexander Povetkin (26-1, 18 KO’s) wants a second shot against IBF/IBO/WBA/WBO heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko (61-3, 51 KO’s) to show him that he’s a better fighter than he showed last Saturday night in losing a 12 round unanimous decision in Moscow, Russia. Povetkin admits that he lost, but he still wants to face the 6’6″ Wladimir again if possible.
Povetkin said to the Voice of Russia “I’m not frightened and I’m going to to set my sights on meeting him again. I lost the battle, but I’ll win the war. Tactically, Wladimir beat me, but I definitely never gave up mentally or physically.”
Wladimir won’t be able to fight Povetkin anytime soon because he has mandatory title defenses coming up starting with Kubrat Pulev. Wladimir is going to be tied up for a while defending all of his titles against the mandatory challengers, but after all that is out of the way, who knows? It’s possible that we could see a Wladimir vs. Povetkin rematch in the near future.
If there is a rematch then one of the sanctioning bodies needs to find a referee that will keep Wladimir from clinching, pulling down on the neck and shoving his opponents because he did a lot of that against Povetkin. Without Wladimir using those tactics for 12 rounds, it’s unknown who would have won the fight. Wladimir seemed to need to be able to hold to keep from getting hit by Povetkin’s shots, and if a referee had been giving Wladimir warnings and taking points away for his holding and shoving, we might have seen a much different outcome.
Wladimir’s holding really seemed to turn off the Moscow, Russia fans that came to the fight because they were booing nonstop for 12 rounds, and it seemed like they didn’t like what they had paid to see. The fans wanted to see a good boxing match, but instead they were stuck watching Wladimir hit Povetkin and then immediately grab him in a clinch.
Some of it wasn’t clinching but rather Wladimir bending Povetkin over by pulling down on his head and neck. The referee really should have stepped in as soon as Wladimir using this tactic in the 1st round and warned him that he would take points off. But the referee working the fight Luis Pabon led Wladimir pull down on Povetkin’s head for the full fight. You can imagine how Povetkin’s neck and back must have felt by the end of the fight after 12 rounds of him being bent forward by Wladimir and leaned on.
Povetkin likely won’t have to fight himself into the position where he’s the mandatory challenger before getting a rematch against Wladimir. He’ll probably get the rematch just based on his popularity in Russia and Germany.
Povetkin is one of the few well known fighters in the heavyweight division, and as we saw last Saturday, he doesn’t have the size to really trouble Wladimir, especially when he’s been pushed, leaned on and held for 12 rounds.
It’s too bad that Wladimir didn’t stop using these tactics on his own in response to the booing of the crowd because he probably could have beaten Povetkin in a normal fight without all the grabbing, leaning and shoving.
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