WBA light heavyweight champion Dmitry Bivol will not defeat joint champion Artur Beterbiev without a stoppage and fight on October 12. Bivol (23-0, 12 KOs) will not be able to catch Beterbiev (20-0, 20 KOs) by turning the fight into a 12 round encounter.
Beterbiev cuts the ring so well that Bivol can’t move, and he can’t work himself up by staying on the road the entire fight. Bivol is 33 and not young enough to move for three minutes per round.
Bivol vs. Beterbiev will be shown live on DAZN PPV from the Kingdom Arena in Riyadh. The odds have Bivol as the favorite because of his youth, boxing skills, and the fact that Beterbiev is coming off a knee injury.
“It’s an amazing fight in my career. Boxing fans want to see this fight,” said Dmitry Bivol on talkSport about his match with Artur Beterbiev. “It’s good that the two fights have different styles. It’s interesting.
“Yes, it helped my work to be widely known. I got a lot of boxing fans in that fight,” said Bivol about his fight with Canelo Alvarez in 2022. “It was a border war. If we pass, we can go to the next level.”
Fortunately for fans, Honorable Turki Alalshikh was interested in making the Beterbiev vs. Bivol because we may never have seen it happen because of networks and promoters.
“I have nothing in my head after October 12. Only this fight for the belts, and then we will see. I knew this fight would happen soon,” said Bivol about his fight with Beterbiev.
“This should be a thing of the past. I described it as the light-heavyweight version of Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier. That’s how close they are and how they fit together,” said journalist Colin Hart speaking to Pro Boxing fans. “Beterbiev is a beast when he steps into that ring. He’s 39, and he shouldn’t be where he is at 39.”
Bivol doesn’t fight like a version of Muhammad Ali, who started fighting Joe Frazier, and Beterbiev is nothing like Frazier. If anything, Bivol fights more like a smaller version Wladimir Klitschko before he started training with Emanuel Steward.
When Wladimir was young, he was a puncher who moved a lot. After the Steward caught Wladimir, he greatly increased the training. He became kind of like Lennox Lewis.
“He has 20 fights and 20 undefeated. Bivol defeated Canelo. That gives you an idea of how good it is. So, flip a coin. I have to believe that Beterbiev will win. It will be the first time he has been taken away,” said Hart.
It will be difficult for Bivol to finish all 12 rounds against Beterbiev because he has many bad habits that will create chances for him to be taken out. Bivol habits:
- Fighting the ropes: Bivol often sticks against the ropes and looks to close. That worked against guys like Canelo, Gilberto Ramirez, and Lyndon Arthur, but I don’t think it will against Beterbiev.
- Throwing combinations: This is a huge flaw in Bivol’s game because he was a competitive striker from day one. He likes to throw combinations of two to four and sometimes seven.
“His power is his only skill. That’s what will defeat Beterbiev. “He’s very talented and very smart,” Hart said of Bivol. “It’s amazing when you think that two Russians will talk about the topic in Riyadh. It gives you an idea of the difference in boxing now compared to the past.”
Bivol’s skills may not be enough to contain Beterbiev, who will force him to fight at some point in the tournament. He can’t move all 12 rounds without stopping and exchanging with Beterbiev without risking losing the decision. The judges will not do as Bivol likes if he is to defend himself as they did to Lyndon Arthur and Craig Richards. Those fights were hard to watch because Bivol showed no heart.
“It is a fight that people will want to see. “I’m not saying that people on the sidelines of boxing will say the same thing because I’m sure they don’t know much about both of them,” said Hart.
Casual fans won’t bother buying the Beterbiev vs. Bivol on DAZN PPV. However, a fair amount will watch on ESPN+ if they have a subscription and tune in on October 12.
Casual fans won’t go looking for the event because these are foreign acts, and the undercard is something most UK guys, even diehards, won’t want to see in the US.
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