Ward vs. Bika on Saturday

By Boxing News - 11/22/2010 - Comments

By Scott Gilfoid: WBA super middleweight champion Andre Ward (22-0, 13 KO’s) defends his World boxing Association title on Saturday against super middleweight contender Sakio Bika (28-4-2, 19 KO’s) at the Oracle Aren,a in Oakland, California.

Ward, 26, will be fighting in front of a large home audience, which could be as many as 10,000 fans to cheer him on in this non-Super Six tournament bout in Ward’s home city. Bika, 31, is a good fighter and should make it interesting in the process of getting totally dominated by Ward.

I expect Bika to give a good account of himself and not just lay down for Ward and make it easy for him. This is why I life Bika as an opponent. He’s good enough to be switched out with the other Super Six tournament opponents Glen Johnson, Carl Froch and Arthur Abraham without losing anything.

It’s too bad that Bika wasn’t involved with the tournament because I can see him beating Froch and Abraham. Not sure about Johnson, but Bika would give the older fighter problems because he wouldn’t be taken out with looping shots the way that Allan Green was in his recent loss to Johnson.

Ward is the current Super Six tournament leader, with wins over Green and Mikkel Kessler. Ward is already guaranteed a spot in the semifinals of the tournament. It’s unclear who Ward will be facing at that time, but whoever ends up as Ward’s opponent for that fight, they can pretty much consider it a loss because Ward can’t be beaten now that his only worthy opponent Andre Dirrell has pulled out of the tournament due to a serious injury.

Ward’s fight with Bika will be shown on the same night as the Abraham vs. Froch fight. Ward’s bout will come on immediately after the Froch-Abraham bout on Showtime in a split doubleheader.

This will give viewers a chance to evaluate and compare Ward’s talent to that of Froch and Abraham. I think boxing fans will see what I already know – that Ward is a level or two above Froch and Abraham in talent. Their fight will give fans a good picture of how boxing used to be done back in the past before the more skilled fighters like Ward & Dirrell and many other talents came on and civilized the sport.



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