By Scott Gilfoid: Former light heavyweight world champion Antonio Tarver is giving #1 WBO contender Tyson Fury (24-0, 18 KOs) absolutely no chance at all of beating IBF/IBO/WBA/WBO heavyweight world champion Wladimir Klitschko (64-3, 53 KOs) in their fight on October 24th at the ESPRIT arena, Düsseldorf, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany. Tarver notes that Klitschko isn’t the same fighter that he once was, but he still sees him as way too good for the likes of Tyson Fury.
It’s hard to disagree with Tarver about Klitschko being too good, because even though he’s starting to look like a shot fighter at 39, he can still pack a big punch and move really well around the ring. There’s nothing wrong with Wladimir’s punching power, his excellent jab and his mobility.
What does seem to be off with Wladimir is his work rate, his ability to pull the trigger on his shots, and his accuracy. He’s no longer accurate, he doesn’t seem capable of throwing a lot of punches, and he’s not able to pull the trigger on his punches any longer. Wladimir used to fire off shots all the time, but now he just waits, waits and waits before he finally throws a single punch, and much of the time he misses even when his opponent is right there in front of him.
“Come on, are you kidding me?” Tarver said to Fightnews when asked if he thought Fury had a chance of pulling off an upset and beating Wladimir. “I give him no chance in hell of beating Klitschko. That don’t say much because Klitschko isn’t the Klitschko of old. He’s a lot older than me in boxing year, a lot older. I am coming after those titles, period.”
The thing that Wladimir has going in his favor is Fury’s lack of punch resistance. He’s been hurt by 2nd and 3rd tier fighters who didn’t have much in the way of power. Steve Cunningham put Fury down, and he’s not a big puncher. If Wladimir is able to let his hands go enough to actually land something, then Fury is going to likely be down for the 10 count because he’s not going to be able to take Wladimir’s big punches without getting dropped.
“Update, training hard, in 4th week, really motivated about this fight, got a good feeling, expect the best Klitschko ever! Poor old me 😥😥😥” Fury said on his Twitter.
It won’t be the best Klitschko ever, that’s for sure. The best Klitschko ever left town perhaps 10 years ago when his late trainer Emanuel Steward redesigned his game back in 2005. Wladimir was very good back then, but he’s maybe not even half the fighter now than he was back then. But Fury is so vulnerable that even Wladimir at 50% capacity will likely be more than enough to KO Fury and send him home in defeat.
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