By Nate Anderson: There’s a lot on the line this Friday night when big Tyson Fury (7-0, 7 KO’s) takes on John McDermott (25-5, 15 KO’s) for the British heavyweight title at the Brentwood Centre. To start with, Fury will be hoping to continue his knockout streak a little while longer, and then there’s the matter of the bragging rights of England.
The fighter that emerges victorious on Friday night will be perceived by many boxing fans as the number #1 heavyweight in the UK. Danny Williams might have something to say about that, though, since he recently beat McDermott in two consecutive fights.
The Brentwood Centre is already reportedly close to a sell out as I write this and will likely be sold out soon due to the excitement that his fight has generated among fans. McDermott, 29, cannot afford to lose the fight if he wants to stay relevant. This would be a third straight loss and it would be hard to see him coming back from this.
McDermott, who looks like he just climbed off a stool at a local pub, will have to be able to fight a lot harder than he did in his last fight against Williams in in May. In that fight, McDermott looked totally exhausted by the 5th round, and spent much of the remainder of the night hanging all over Williams trying to catch his breath.
Fury, 6’9”, won’t likely be allowing McDermott too many rest breaks in the fight. Fury likes to work on the inside and if McDermott tries to cling to him like he did in his last two fights with Williams, McDermott will find himself getting drilled in the midsection with hard body shots from Fury.
If there was ever a fighter that would seem all wrong for McDermott, it would have to be Fury. McDermott can take a heck of a shot to the head, but he seems to react negatively when he’s taking shots to his thick midsection.
Fury will likely see McDermott’s fat belly an inviting target for his body shots and this fight may very well end up being stopped within two or three rounds. McDermott need to guard against Fury’s body attacks by keeping his guard low. However, if he does that, McDermott will have to count on his good chin holding up for as long as possible.
McDermott needs this win to get another shot at Williams. I see that as a wasted effort on McDermott’s part, because he doesn’t match up well against Williams because of Danny’s better jab and power. A third fight between them would probably end with the same result, Williams winning a third 12 round decision, and the ringside crowd being bored to tears due to awful clinching between them.
Fury, 21, is counting on being able to intimidate McDermott before the fight. Fury thinks that he will have the fight won before he even enters the ring if he can get McDermott mentally unglued. It seems kind of silly to me, because as big as 6’9” Fury is, he doesn’t need to resort to gimmicks like trying to scare his opponents by giving them the evil eye before the fight.
If Fury can’t beat a fighter like McDermott, then he doesn’t belong in the boxing ring. He can stare down anyone, but if he can’t back it up in the ring, what’s the point? Fury looked less than impressive in his last fight against Aleksandrs Selezens in July. Fury took him out in three rounds, but looked fat and slow in the process, missing many of his shots. Fury wasn’t impressed with his performance either, but blamed it on a back injury which he says prevented him from training properly for the fight.
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