Burns vs. Indongo: Julius wants to KO Ricky

Boxingnews24.com

By Scott Gilfoid: IBF light welterweight champion Julius Indongo is not worried at all about the crowd for his unification fight this Saturday night against WBA World 140lb champion Ricky “Rickster” Burns at the SSE Hydro in Glasgow, Scotland. Indongo, 34, will be venturing into hostile territory when he battles Burns for his WBA strap in front of a large crowd of 8,000 of Burns’ boxing fans.

The winner of this fight could get a nice payday against former 4 division world champion Adrien “The Problem” Broner, so it’s very, very important for both to try their best to win. Burns, 34, is calling it the biggest fight of his pro career, and it may very well be. The money that Burns will get in a fight against Broner would likely surpass anything that he’s gotten up to this point.

It would be good cash for Burns, who was seen as a shot fighter by many boxing fans several years ago when he was getting beaten left and right by the likes of Terence Crawford, Dejan Zlaticanin and Omar Figueroa. Burns just barely dodged another defeat during that same period in his contest with Ray Beltran in September 2013. That appeared to be a clear loss for Burns, but the judges gave him a 12 round draw out of the fight.

It showed how hard it is to beat Burns when he’s fighting in his hometown of Glasgow. Boxing News 24 scored the Burns-Beltran fight 10 rounds to 2 in favor of Beltran.

“We’ve had calls from the likes of Adrien Broner, everybody in the division is watching this fight because the winner is going to walk away with belts and be a real big target but this is a very tough fight, a 50-50 fight, and one we believe our man is going to do the business for on Saturday,” said Burns’ promoter Eddie Hearn to skysports.com.

Burns (41-5-1, 14 KOs) and Indongo (21-0, 15 KOs) are both up there in age at 34, and we’re probably talking about guys that wouldn’t be world champions if the 140lb division was consolidated down to just one title instead of 4, which is now. These two guys are good enough to be title holders for the time being, but I cannot see either of them staying at the position without very careful match-making. Burns has won his last 4 fights, but against average opposition and not the true talents in the light welterweight division. Here are the guys that Burns has beaten recently: Kiryl Relikh, Michele Di Rocco, Josh King and Prince Ofotsu.

You can argue that even some of the bottom dwellers in the 140lb division would beat those guys. Let’s be real. Burns’ last 4 opponents have been pretty weak. The sad thing is Burns won the vacant WBA World 140lb champion in his fight against Di Rocco. I hate to think what would happen to Burns if he had to fight someone good like Viktor Postol, Broner or Rances Barthlemy. I don’t think for a second that Burns would have ever won the World Boxing Association title if he had to fight any of those guys. The same goes for Indongo with his IBF strap. I don’t think he could beat any of those three guys.

“Fighting away from home has never been a problem,” said Indongo to Sky Sports News HQ. “The KO will be a bonus but we’re training for hard rounds, I am undefeated and have no doubts that I will stay that way,” said Indongo.

Indongo should DEFINITELY be looking for a knockout of Burns on Saturday night. I would hope that Indongo’s trainer and management would have stressed this point. It’s not going to be easy for Indongo to win a decision against Burns. He’s the visiting fighter, and I doubt that the judges are going to give him many rounds due to the crowd screaming each time Burns throws anything. The judges should have earphones on so that they can’t hear the crowd screaming. The theory that judges are influenced unconsciously by crowd noise is a debatable one.

I happen to think it’s true. All you need to do is look at fights where the home fighter walks away with frequent controversial decisions. Indongo has the punching power to make sure that the judges don’t have a say so. Indongo just needs to make sure that he is able to land something on the button in this fight. Burns uses so much head movement, it makes it very hard to hit him unless you take power off your shots or are willing to throw a massive amount of punches just to land one big one. It’s obviously hard for fighters to put everything they have in punch after punch. Indongo has pretty good hand speed, so it’s possible he could connect with something big.

“100 per cent. I said it as soon as the fight was made, for me this is the biggest fight,” said Burns to skysports.com about the Indongo fight is the biggest one of his career.

Obviously, Indongo does not compare to some of Burns’ past opponents like Terence Crawford, Kevin Mitchell and Michael Katsidis as far notoriety in the boxing world, but it’s a fight that has a lot on the line. It’s the biggest fight of Burns’ career due to the big payday he can get for the Adrien Broner fight. If Burns beats Indongo on Saturday, he could put himself in the position to face “The Problem.” A loss for Burns would mean that he would need to hit the reset button on his career, especially if it’s a brutal knockout loss like the one Indongo’s last opponent Eduard Troyanovsky suffered against him last December. Indongo knocked Troyanovsky out with a single left hand to the head in round 1. The Russian fighter Troyanovsky was too hurt to get back to his feet to resume fighting.

Hearn is saying the Burns-Indongo fight is a 50-50 affair, and he may be right. I can’t pick a winner. I’m kind of leaning in the direction of Burns in this fight due to the fight being held in Glasgow. I would give Indongo the edge if the fight were staged at a neutral venue, but I don’t think Burns would ever agree to that.