Cleverly’s unbeaten record on the line against Kovalev

By Boxing News - 07/07/2013 - Comments

kovalev453By Scott Gilfoid: WBO light heavyweight champion Nathan Cleverly (26-0, 12 KO’s) will be facing the big punching Sergey Kovalev (21-0-1, 19 KO’s) next month on August 17th at the Motorpoint Arena in Cardiff, Wales, UK. We could be seeing Cleverly say goodbye to both his unbeaten record and his WBO 175 lb. title on the same night.

Kovalev is definitely a level above some of the truly awful opposition that Cleverly has been consistently matched up against during his 8 year pro career. When you get a fighter that has been matched carefully the way that Cleverly has been, and you put him all of a sudden with someone that can actually fight like Kovalev, bad things can happen.

This isn’t your typical record-padding fodder opponent that Cleverly is facing here. Kovalev has a real shot of beating Clevely and taking the judges – and crowd – out of the equation next month when he faces Cleverly in front of Cleverly’s own fans at the Motorpoint Arena, Cardiff, Wales, UK.

Cleverly is really in tough in this fight because all the tricks that he’s used to beat the mediocre he’s been matched up against probably won’t work in this fight against the hard hitting Kovalev.

Cleverly won’t be able to lean back far against the ropes to avoid getting hit in the head because Kovalev likes to throw body shots.

If Cleverly tries that trick against Kovalev, he’s going to be getting nailed in the body with some hard gust busting shots.

If Cleverly tries to beat Kovalev by throwing nonstop punches, then he’s going to be playing right up the Russian’s alley because he loves when his opponents trade shots with him because then he can land his big power shots over and over again.

Given that Cleverly can’t punch, I think it favors Kovalev if Cleverly is dumb enough to try and outwork him instead of running for the hills.



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