By Jeff Aranow: Tony Bellew is predicting that Anthony Crolla (31-5-3, 13 KOs) will emerge as the winner on Saturday night in his rematch against WBA World lightweight champion Jorge Linares (41-3, 27 KOs) at the Manchester Arena in Manchester, England. Bellew, who holds the WBC cruiserweight champion, sees Crolla getting the victory by his high work rate. Crolla isn’t normally a high work rate type of fighter. He’s more of a fighter that likes to jab slowly and work himself in position to throw his body shots.
If Crolla tries to change his fighting style for this fight against Linares, he could be inviting trouble. Crolla won’t last long if he stands and throws power shots with Linares. This isn’t Derry Mathews that Crolla is fighting. Linares has very good boxing skills and the kind of power that will make it a short night if Crolla uses the wrong tactics on Saturday.
If Crolla is going to try and beat Linares, 31, with a high volume attack on Saturday, then he’s going to need to take a lot of heavy shots from the hard hitting and highly skilled Linares. Crolla has never been a big puncher during his 11-year pro career, but he recently picked up a couple of knockouts against Ismael Barroso and Darleys Perez.
I think Crolla fell in love with his power after those knockouts and he tried to stop Linares last September. When the knockout failed to happen after 5 rounds, Crolla found himself taking heavy shots from Linares. Crolla was hurt in round 6, and things went downhill for him after that. Linares worked Crolla over with one good hand and a damaged right hand, which he had hurt. Tomorrow night, Linares will be at full power with no injuries to his hands or anything else.
“I see it being a really tough, hard-fought fight with Jorge Linares, but I just see Anthony Crolla edging it on points with the better work-rate,” said Bellew to skysports.com. “I think his game-plan will be on point this time and I think he will stick to it stringently.”
Crolla would be better off focusing on using his boxing skills to stay in there long enough to where he can set a trap and knock Linares out in the later rounds. It would be a mistake for Crolla to try and throw a lot of punches early in the fight when Linares is fresh, because he’s very skilled and he’s the better fighter of the two.
Crolla is a good blue collar type of guy, but he doesn’t have the same pedigree that Linares has going for him. Linares is the type of fighter that was always a very talented fighter from the moment he turned pro. He’s lost some fights over the years, but those were against big punchers that connected with their best shots. Crolla is not a big puncher and it would be a big mistake for him to try and pretend that he’s all of a sudden a knockout threat to Linares.
This is kind of the last hoorah for both fighters. The winner of the Linares-Crolla fight will be facing Mikey Garca in what will be a certain loss. The loser of the fight will find themselves in a situation where the belts are owned by very talented champions in Mikey Garcia, Terry Flanagan and Robert Easter Jr. Those are guys that are not going anywhere at all. Linares and Crolla would have a hard time beating those fighters. Flanagan might be the weak link among those three, but he still appears to be better than Linares and Crolla. Crolla and Linares can still be good contenders after the smoke clears in the division, but just not champions unless one of these guys moves up to `140.