By Brian Webber: Gennadiy Golovkin says he always knew that Canelo Alvarez was beatable, but now it’s clear following his one-sided loss to Dmitry Bivol last May.
Golovkin (42-1-1, 37 KOs) wants to hand the superstar Canelo (57-2-2, 39 KOs) his second consecutive victory on September 17th in their headliner on DAZN PPV at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
If Golovkin, 40, can follow the same blueprint that Bivol used, he’s got an excellent chance of having his hand raised against Alvarez.
At this point in Golovkin’s career, he’s probably not going to change his style of fighting to try and use the same tactics that Bivol used to defeat Canelo, but it would be a good idea for him to at least try.
Bivol’s tactics against Canelo:
- In & out attacks
- Combination punching
- Tight guard
- Powerful jab
Bivol’s emphasis on throwing combinations kept Canelo busy on defense, as it made his work difficult to throw his counter shots.
Canelo’s bread & butter is his counter-punching, but he’s not good at countering when his opponents throw three or more punches in combination.
He’s not comfortable at leaving himself open on defense when his opponents are firing off combos, as he doesn’t want to get hit.
“I’ve known Canelo for a long time, and I’ve always known that it was possible, and Dmitri Bivol just showed us that,” said Gennadiy Golovkin to the nypost about Canelo Alvarez’s recent defeat.
“Some experts were under the illusion that Canelo was unbeatable; I never shared that opinion. That loss kind of brought the situation back to reality, back to the actual state of things,” said Golovkin.
The loss showed the boxing public and the judges that Canelo isn’t infallible, and he can be beaten by a fighter that is smart & disciplined.
“He will take our fight much more seriously, and that will be a totally different fight compared with his fight against Bivol,” said Golovkin about Alvarez.
Canelo will be working on the flaws in his game that Bivol exposed, and he’ll likely incorporate some of the things he did into his own game.
“I realized that those people who gave those scores, they were used,” said Golovkin about the judges’ scoring of his first two fights against Canelo.
“They were used like disposable tissues are being used. It was time to use them; they were used and disposed of,” said Golovkin.
