(Photo credit: Will Hart, K2 Promotions) By Jim Dower: Former IBF/WBA middleweight champion Daniel Geale (30-2, 16 KOs) expects to hand WBA middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin (29-0, 26 KOs) his first loss of his career on Saturday night in their big fight.
Geale, 33, has studied Golovkin’s past fights and seen some huge holes in his game that he feels he can exploit on Saturday night. Geale isn’t saying what those flaws are, but it’s quite possible that he’s seen that Golovkin is easy to hit due to his habit of putting everything he has into each shot he throws.
Golovkin has fallen in love with his own power, and this causes him to commit 100% to every shot he throws. Geale plans on hitting Golovkin with quick shots and then retreat each time before he has a chance to load up with one of his big punches.
The other thing that Geale feels that he take advantage of his Golovkin’s inexperience in fighting deep into his fights. The last time that Golovkin went into the later rounds was in 2011 when he was taken to the 10th round by Kassim Ouma in a fight in which Golovkin took a great deal of punishment. Ouma did a good job of staying out of range to avoid many of Golovkin’s big shots.
When Ouma would come forward to engage, he would land one or two punches and then back out. What ultimately hurt Ouma was staying a little too long in the pocket and that gave Golovkin an opportunity to hurt him with a big right hand. To Golovkin’s credit, he was able to carry his power deep into the fight. He still punching with major power, but he was clearly exhausted and badly lumped up by Ouma.
“I’m very confident going into this fight, Golovkin is one of the best fighters in the world but I can beat him,” Geale said. “We have a game plan and I know what I need to do on Saturday night to be victorious. I’ve fought all over the world so I have no problem fighting in Madison Square Garden against Golovkin. I want the titles and he’s got two of them. I always wanted to fight him and I’m ready to win on Saturday night.”
Geale says he’s not going to give Golovkin a chance to get his big power shots off in this fight. He knows that if he stands in front of the Kazakhstan fighter then he’s going to wind up taking a beating in the fight and likely stopped.
Geale has good power, but he doesn’t have the kind of power that would enable him to stay in the pocket for long durations against a furious puncher like Golovkin. That’s why Geale’s plan is to dart around the ring, hammer Golovkin with hard shots, and fly away as fast as possible to keep him from loading up with one of his big shots. This in turn is going to put a lot of pressure on Golovkin to ease up on the power on his shots in order to pick up more speed and accuracy. If Golovkin fights as he usually does with him trying to KO Geale with every shot, he’s going to miss a lot and get out-boxed.
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