Kalle Sauerland: Chisora vs. Price is a toss-up fight

Image: Kalle Sauerland: Chisora vs. Price is a toss-up fight
By Boxing News - 10/10/2019 - Comments

By Sean Jones: Promoter Kalle Sauerland is predicting a stoppage in the October 26th heavyweight contest between Dereck Chisora (31-9, 22 KOs) and David Price (25-6, 20 KOs) at the O2 Arena in London, UK. Sauerland says the fight is a pick ’em match that could go either way.

Unlike the boxing public, Sauerland is sitting on the fence in not making a pick in this fight. He probably has a good idea who he feels will win, but he’s not saying.

Price is getting a big payday to come in and face Chisora on 3 weeks’ notice. It’s not just a big payday that Price is getting. He’s getting an opportunity to put himself in position for a big fight if he beats Chisora.

Price taking a gamble with his career

It’s a gamble on Price’s part in taking this fight, but it potentially will have a big payoff if he wins. Two years ago, it would have been unthinkable for Price to be in a fight like this. After Price was knocked out by Christian Hammer and Alexander Povetkin, he was seen as over-the-hill.

Price vs. Chisora are the co-feature bout on the Regis Prograis vs. Josh Taylor card. The fight will be shown on DAZN and Sky Sports Box Office.

Chisora and Price close to the same age in their mid-30s, and both of them have for whatever reason failed to win the biggest fights of their respective careers. However, Kalle says the winner of the Chisora-Price fight will be able to take their career to the next level. Just what that means is unclear.

Obviously, Chisora and Price would like to fight for a world title against Anthony Joshua, Andy Ruiz Jr. or Deontay Wilder. Neither of them are ranked high enough at this moment to attain mandatory status for the champions. The most the Chisora-Price can hope for is to get a voluntary title shot against one of the belt holders.

Price is the underdog

Despite being the underdog, the 6’8″ Price has momentum going into this fight with Chisora in having won his last three contests. Since losing to Sergey Kuzmin last year in September, Price has looked sharp in defeating Tom Little, Kash Ali and Dave Allen.

Granted those are all domestic level heavyweights, but they were still good enough tests for Price to show that he’s still learning and improving. His loss to Kuzmin wasn’t a stoppage in the real sense. Price suffered a torn right bicep that caused the fight to be stopped.

If Price can throw punches, he’s got the power and the size to give Chisora all he can handle. Chisora struggles when he faces the larger heavyweights. He’s short for a heavyweight at 6’2″, and his style involves a lot of body shots. Because of Chisora’s focus on going to the body, he gets hit a lot. If Price connects cleanly with his power shots, he can knock Chisora out. Chisora can take a good punch, but he doesn’t have a steel chin. Dillian Whyte and David Haye stopped Chisora in the past. Tyson Fury punished Chisora steadily until his corner pulled him out of the fight in the 10th round.

Sauerland: The Chisora vs. Price winner will go to the next level

“This is two guys that have been there, and haven’t won those big fights,” said Kalle Sauerland to secondsout about Chisora vs. Price bout. “Now one of them is going to go on to the next level. The other thing I’ll say is hats off to Pricey for jumping on. The good thing for the fans is you’re not going to get a last minute replacement who is out of shape. I’ve known David for years. He’s someone that keeps himself in shape. He trains far more than any heavyweight needs to train, and he was in training for a fight.

“So he doesn’t need to quickly put a camp in two weeks. He’s going to come into this in prime condition. It’s going to be really interesting. A lot of people are going to say that Chisora has found a second lease on life in his career. But so has Price to a certain extent, and they both have really good boxing fundamentals. So you’re going to see a really interesting contest,” said Sauerland.

You’ve got to give Price a mess of credit for the way he agreed to step in and take the fight with Chisora on short notice. Up until last week, Chisora was scheduled to fight Joseph Parker on October 26. Parker suffered an illness from a spider bite, and needed to pull out of the card. Matchroom Boxing promoter Eddie Hearn looked around, and found Price to take the fight in short notice.

Chisora-Price won’t go the distance states Kalle

“I’ll make one prediction: It won’t go the distance,” said Sauerland in making a prediction about the Chisora vs Price fight. “I think they’ll have a lot of respect for each other. It’ll be interesting to see fight week. Whether there will be fun and games or whether they’ll say, ‘we’ll let our fists do the talking.’ I can’t see that with the personalities involved.

“I’ve seen David in the most recent point of his career develop a real spite, which is real fun to watch as well. For the fans, it’s a pick ’em. Both the fights are pick ’em fights. We’ve got a fight, a great fight between two of the most popular British heavyweights in recent times,” said Sauerland.

For Price to win, he’s going to have to go the full 12 round distance most likely. Chisora has an ability to soak up punishment most of the time. When he has been stopped, it’s been against guys that took advantage of him being overaggressive. Chisora lost his composure in his fights with Haye and Whyte [rematch], and he was stopped.

Price will need to let his hands go, and use his jab for him to win. Above all, Price must stay off the ropes. Chisora’s last opponent Artur Szpilka made the mistake of backing up to the ropes, and this made him a sitting duck. Szpilka was then stopped in the 2nd round. Price has a good enough jab to control Chisora from the outside, but he’ll need to lean backwards when he throws it.

Price physically ready for Chisora bout

“I’m very excited for this fight,” said Price. “I kept in the gym all summer because I had a feeling I had to be ready for a call like this, and ready I am.”

Price can’t be afraid to throw punches. He’s got to control the action like he did in his recent 10th round stoppage win over Dave Allen on October 20. Price won that fight by boxing Allen from the outside. Price needs to fight Chisora the same way he did Allen if he wants to win.

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