Andre Ward isn’t ready for Kovalev says Abel Sanchez
Posted: 24 Oct 2016, 11:57
is it me, or does Sanchez talk a lot? lol.. whether he's right or not.Light heavyweight champion Sergey “Krusher” Kovalev’s former trainer Abel Sanchez thinks unbeaten former super middleweight champion Andre “SOG” Ward (30-0, 15 KOs) isn’t ready to take on a top 175lb fighter like Kovalev (30-0-1, 26 KOs), and he expects him to lose their fight on November 19 on HBO pay-per-view at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Sanchez thinks the 32-year-old Ward was a great fighter many years ago when he was in the Super Six tournament from 2009 to 2011, but that fighter no longer seems to exist. Ward has changed, and Sanchez has seen that. Further, Sanchez feels that Ward is taking too quick of a step up in facing the 33-year-old Kovalev in just his third fight since moving up to light heavyweight.
In terms of preparation, Ward’s preparation for the Kovalev fight has been poor. Ward has only fought once against a real light heavyweight since moving up to the division in 2015. The only true 175lb fighter that Ward has fought since making his comeback last year was Sullivan Barrera. Ward’s other two fights in his comeback have come against arguably mediocre super middleweights in Alexander Brand and Paul Smith. It’s anyone’s guess why Ward and his promoters at Roc Nation Sports decided to use super middleweights to get him ready for a fight against Kovalev. It seems they’ve done things backwards. The types of opponents that Ward has been facing are guys that would get him ready to fight at 168 against champions like James DeGale, Badou Jack and Gilberto Ramirez.