candyslim wrote: ↑31 Aug 2018, 09:10
I felt as I was watching that Takam was in danger of punching himself out. The ending was as big a shock to me as everyone else, but I can't help thinking he wouldn't have been battering Dereck the way he was if he'd had one eye on his 'fuel gauge'.
One thing was clear, Dereck Chisora employed the age-old rope-a-dope strategy against Carlos Takam, because the Brit was physically outgunned and also less-skilled. He looked like a fighter that could do nothing other than hope that his opponent fatigued at some point during the late stages of the bout.
The Sky Sports commentators correctly claimed during the middle rounds that the French guy was punching himself out and occasionally throwing arm punches that had no power in them.
I always felt that Chisora was capable of staging a late rally, with the gassed-out Takam being highly-vulnerable and potentially being overwhelmed by a lengthy barrage of shots, but I was admittedly shocked at how Dereck managed to essentially score a one-punch KO.
However, let’s face it, any orthodox fighter that chooses to stand very close to their opponent, with their back against the ropes and their left-hand dangling around their lead leg, is always going to be highly-susceptible to being clobbered by an almighty hellacious overhead right-hand.
And Takam didn’t just make this mistake once, he did the very same thing twice in quick succession, which means that Chisora’s stoppage victory really wasn’t that much of a fluke, considering his opponent was too exhausted to implement very basic boxing fundamentals.
To be honest, if Takam had committed the very same sin during the opening three minutes of the bout, then I wouldn’t have been surprised if Chisora would have exploited the opportunity and scored a first stoppage, such was the severity of Frenchman’s mistake.
Carlos Takam was more than capable of beating Dereck Chisora very easily, but he somehow managed to “
snatch defeat from the jaws of victory” and now I feel that he’s now become a spent force, due to suffering such a devastating loss.