By Derek Holian: Somehow, some fight fans seem pretty sure that Evander Holyfield was on his way to taking a beating against Sherman ‘the tank’ Williams had there fight continued at the weekend. However im not quite sure how they can justify this prediction. Yes Evander certainly looked a little slow off the mark, and yes he got cut from a clash of heads, and had to take a couple of right hands, but anyone who has followed Evanders career will know Evander has always been somewhat of a slow starter, and with age and inactivity he is becoming increasingly a slower starter.

The perfect example of this was his fight against Botha, had that fight abruptly ended after three rounds due to a cut, im pretty sure it would have looked the same way. However, Evander came on strong in the second half of that fight and stopped Botha.

Evander is mainly a counter puncher who boxes in a rhythm, and off of the other boxers rhythm. However the short, squat Williams doesn’t really fight in a rhythm, and I think this confused Evanders timing a little, in the same way as John Ruiz style did. However, had this fight continued minus the cut mishap, I think Evander would have warmed up and found a rhythm, used his greater experience and came on stronger to grind out a points decision against the tough but limited Williams.

I wouldn’t mind seeing a rematch and I would expect a decent fight, but nothing at the weekend would lead me to change my original prediction that Evander would have come on strong in the second half of the fight and won a points decision in a decent fight. HOLYFIELD QUIT? NEVER…..!!!!

Evander said he planned to get stitches and he wasn’t sure of his status concerning his next scheduled fight on March 5 against Brian Nielson in Denmark. He said “Stuff like this happens and I’ll shake it off,” “Hopefully, I’ll get this stitched up and it won’t be a problem. Life goes on. It’s part of boxing.”