By Eric Thomas: Former World Boxing Association (WBA) light welterweight champion Andriy Kotelnik (31-3, 13 KO’s) has a huge obstacle in front of him on Saturday night against IBF/WBC light welterweight champion Devon Alexander (20-0, 13 KO’s) in a 12 round bout at the Scottrade Center in Saint Louis, Missouri.
While few boxing fans are giving the 32-year-old Ukrainian Kotelnik much of any chance at pulling off an upset over Alexander, promoter Don King thinks Kotelnik is going to be a really tough obstacle for Alexander, saying in an article at the Nypost.com, “He’s [Kotelnik] a great fighter and everybody is going to be shocked and amazed at his will. He’s not coming in to be an accommodation. He’s coming into win.”
King may be right. Kotelnik is a tough fighter with an excellent chin and better power than he’s given credit for. Kotelnik may have recently lost his WBA junior welterweight title to Amir Khan last year, but Khan chose to run from Kotelnik the entire fight rather than mix it up with him for 12 rounds.
Alexander is likely to be a lot more daring and a lot more hittable than Khan proved to be. If Kotelnik has a target to hit, he can do well. Still, Alexander will likely chose to follow Khan’s blue print for much of the fight and use a lot of circling of the ring to prevent Kotelnik from being able to land his powerful jabs.
However, unless Alexander comes in at Kotelnik to land his shots, the fight will turn into the exact kind of bout which Kotelnik likes. If all Alexander is doing is jabbing with Kotelnik, then Andriy will do well. What Alexander needs to do if he wants to get Kotelnik off balance is to take the fight to the inside where Kotelnik is much less comfortable.
Kotelnik had problems keeping Marcos Maidana on the outside last year in his narrow 12 round decision win over Maidana. Alexander will have to be willing to get hit a lot more than he’s been used to getting hit, because Kotelnik is a lot more skilled than any other fighter that Alexander has faced before.
Up until now, the best fighter that Alexander has faced was Junior Witter last year. However, Witter was up there in age when he fought Alexander, yet still gave him a ton of problems. Kotelnik can do pretty much the same things that Witter can do, but with better power and the ability fight without breaking down physically.
Comments are closed.