Vitali: Wladimir must dominate Joshua

Boxingnews24.com

By Scott Gilfoid: Former WBC heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko, the older brother of former IBF/IBO/WBA/WBO heavyweight champ Wladimir Klitschko, says he must “dominate” IBF heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua this Saturday night for him to win at Wembley Stadium in London, England. Vitali doesn’t want the 41-year-old Wladimir to wait and be passive against the younger 27-year-old Joshua, because he feels there will be no second chances for him due to his advanced age.

Vitali thinks that Joshua has room for second chances because he’s so much younger. It will be far easier for Joshua to ramp back up and go after another world title at heavyweight because he’s got a lot of years to get back to the top.

Wladimir lost his last fight to a very beatable Tyson Fury by fighting in a passive and lethargic manner. Wladimir fought the light hitting Fury like he was a knockout puncher rather than just slapper/runner. It should have been an easy fight for Wladimir, because Fury can’t do much other than run and slap.

There was virtually no risk at all for Wladimir if he had let his hands go and belted Fury out at close range, which is obviously what it would have taken for Wladimir to win due to how hard it is to hit the British fighter from long range. Fury was always leaning backwards to avoid the long range shots that Wladimir likes to throw.

It should have been easy for Wladimir to close the distance and knock Fury out at close range, but he failed to make the adjustments to do so. In hindsight, it appeared that Wladimir didn’t have the correct training for Fury’s fighting style, because he should have been completely ready for the tactics that he used. Fury didn’t do anything different in this fight against Wladimir than he had in previous fights.

“Wladimir knows he has to dominate. Not to wait, to come in and show his performance,” Vitali said to Sky Sports’ ‘On the Ropes.’ “No other way. He knows that, I talked to him, many times. He knows that already well. Wladimir doesn’t have a second chance. That’s why we expect full concentration from him and, of course, a good result.”

There’s a right way and a wrong way to go about beating Joshua. The right way is to attack him with quick 3-punch combinations the way that Mihai Nistor used in his knockout win over him in 2011. Nistor showed that Joshua cannot handle 3-punch combinations thrown with speed. Joshua clams up when he’s attacked by more than one punch at a time.

This is perhaps why 2016 Olympic silver medalist Joe Joyce is rumored to have given Joshua major problems in sparring. Joyce comes forward at all times and throws combinations in close. Joyce flurries on his opponents at close range with one punch after another. That’s how Joyce fights. He doesn’t give you a break to start boxing. It’s a style that would always give the long-armed Joshua problems, because he prefers the action to be at long distance where he can dictate the pace of the fight.

Joshua needs the fight to be slow and at range, because he’s a terrible inside fighter. Joshua will never been good at fighting on the inside my opinion, and he will definitely never be a fighter that can fight at a fast pace. Joshua is carrying too much muscle to fight at a furious pace. When you have all that useless body building muscle that Joshua carries around, you’re never going to be able to fight in speedy manner for 3 minutes of every round. Joshua is built for early knockouts and fights that are fought at a slow pace.

The wrong way to fight Joshua is to stand in front of him and act frozen, clueless and afraid to throw punches. I think we’ve seen that with many of Joshua’s recent opponents in Charles Martin, Dominic Breazeale and Eric Molina. Those guys fought the opposite of how Mihai Nistor – and likely Joe Joyce – battled against Joshua. Instead of attacking Joshua with fast 3-4 punch combinations in close, those guys stood on the outside and waited for Joshua to nail them with jabs and right hands. They didn’t fight smart. You’re not going to beat Joshua by letting him be first.

You’re also not going to beat him by standing there without throwing punches. When those fighters did throw punches, it was always one punch at a time. There were no fast three-punch combinations. Those fighters obviously didn’t learn from Nistor’s blueprint in how to beat Joshua. Roberto Cammarelle of Italy and Erislandy Savon of Cuba also used combination punching to beat Joshua in the 2012 London Olympics. They weren’t given the victories by the judges that worked those fights, but they clearly beat Joshua in the opinion of many boxing fans as well as this writer. They got the better of Joshua with their combination punching.

“Wladimir doesn’t have a second chance,” said Vitali. “That’s why we expect full concentration from him and, of course, a good result.”

Yes, I fully agree with Vitali about Wladimir not having a second chance if he loses to Joshua. But instead of thinking about stuff like that, Vitali and Wladimir should be thinking about strategy. Wladimir needs to commit to the right game plan to beat Joshua. If he uses the same plan that Martin, Breazeale and Molina used against Joshua, he’s going to get blasted out quickly. We know what doesn’t work against Joshua. Those fighters showed exactly what not to do against the 6’6” Joshua. Now it’s time for Wladimir to use what has worked in the past to beat Joshua over and over again. Nistor, Cammarelle, Savon and Ivan Dychko all beat Joshua in my opinion. Only Nistor was given the win though. Cammarelle got the better of Joshua twice, as they fought before the 2012 Olympics, and I had the Italian fighter winning that fight as well.

As far as Wladimir getting a rematch with Joshua if things don’t pan out on Saturday, Joshua’s promoter Eddie Hearn has already said there is no rematch clause. The only way there’s a second fight between them is if it’s either very, very close and controversial or if Joshua gets knocked out.