In the World of Boxing there are two distinct ways to climb
to the top- the easy way and the hard way.
The easy way involves hand picking opponents and
manipulating the divisional rankings to generate a title shot and then
hopefully if everything goes your way you land yourself a world title.
Sometimes if you’re lucky enough it is the real thing, but more often than not it’s
either vacant or an interim belt.
Without naming names, such belts have blotted the scene of
Australian Boxing in recent years and left the boxing public scratching their
heads at just what the sport had become. The easy way may line your waist with
gold, but it doesn’t necessarily win you respect. The hard way involves lining
up the biggest and baddest in the division and blasting through all of them
until you are top of the pile and holding all the gold, along with the respect
of the boxing world.
Daniel Geale does not do things the easy way.
There is no denying that Sunday Morning’s clash between
Australia’s IBF Middleweight World Champion, Daniel Geale and Germany’s WBA “Super”
Middleweight Champion, Sebastian Sylvester is anything but a genuine world
title super fight. Both men will put their world titles on the line, in a
division that if the cards fall correctly could give either figher a chance to sit atop its pile.
With the Middleweight division’s top two fighters, Sergio
Martinez and Julio Cesar Chavez Jnr clashing on September 15 in Las Vegas for
the WBC Middleweight Title, and WBO Champion, Dmitry Pirog waiting in the
wings, the contenders to the undisputed Middleweight Crown are falling into
place.
In a division that once brought us the names Leonard,
Hearns, Hagler and Duran, the Middleweight division is shaping up to similar
proportions once again, with Geale in with a real shot of scooping the pool. With
victory on Sunday morning, Geale would move towards potentially one of the
biggest fights Australian Boxing has ever seen.
The fact that Daniel Geale isn’t a household name in
Australia is a crying shame. After years of the circus involving Mr Mundine and
Green and promises by both to “take on the world”, we are still waiting for
both to truly take on genuine heavyweight of their divisions.
Whilst Mundine has
stated he is rolling the dice in America in the twilight of his career in an
attempt to lure the likes of Miguel Cotto and Floyd Mayweather into the ring,
all that sojourn has offered so far is a showing against Bronco “Superman”
McKart which didn’t exactly set the boxing world on fire either in the ring or
at the box office.
Danny Green on the other hand has been a mixed bag, showing
early promise and his own sojourn to Germany, before Light-Heavyweight gold and
a sudden retirement, before an epiphany, a comeback and a dining out on a
washed up Roy Jones, before suffering consecutive knockout defeats to Antonio
Tarver and Krzysztof Wlodarczyk, and recent events give you the sense that Green
is in semi-retirement and only staying active for a potential Mundine rematch
if the “Thunder from Downunder” misfires in the US.
Geale has been Australian Boxings' best kept secret for
years, and only now is he starting to get the respect he deserves. A
Commonwealth Games Gold Medallist and Two-Time World Champion, who could walk
down the street and hardly, get recognised. Some of Australia’s best, Vic
Darchinyan, Michael Katsidis and Paul Briggs, have been in absolute wars, yet
never received the adulation they deserved.
Geale started his ascension to the upper echelon of World
Boxing, capturing the lesser fancied, IBO Middleweight Title against fellow
Australian, Daniel Dawson in Australia’s Fight of the Year in 2007. Two routine
defences were followed by a controversial split-decision loss to Anthony “The
Man” Mundine, and such was the controversy the IBO sanctioned an immediate
rematch on review. Mundine promptly denied Geale a rematch by vacating the
title.
From there, Geale knocked out the then world rated and Contender
Australia Runner-Up, Kariz Kariuki before knocking out the tough Roman Karmazin
to win his shot at then IBF Middleweight Champion, Sebastian Sylvester.
Geale showed the world he belonged with an impressive
performance, pulling off seemingly the impossible, winning a world title in
Germany, against a German hero and by split decision no less. Anyone who
remembers the Danny Green-Markus Beyer fiasco understands the type of
controversy that plagues such encounters. The fact that two judges scored the
fight 118-110 and 118-112 to Geale and the other 118-110 to Sylvester shows
that everything not everything it as it seems when in the land of Beer and
Pretzels.
Despite the unwritten rule in boxing that the challenger
must defeat the champion convincingly to claim his title, perhaps it was
justice done, given the controversial defeat to Mundine in similar
circumstances.
Geale has followed up his win over Sylvester with two
routine mandatory defences against tough Africans,Erosele Albert and Ousamanu
Adama. A unification clash with tough WBO Champion, Dmitry Pirog was aborted
after the WBO refused to sanction the fight, however Geale’s drive has not been
dented, and promptly diving head first into unification fight with Sturm.
Whilst many feel Geale has bitten off a little more than he
can chew this time in tempting fate and returning to Germany to try and pull of
the impossible a second time, I feel Sturm is ripe for the picking. Gary Shaw,
Geale’s promoter and The Grange Old School Boxing team are no mugs, and
certainly know what they are getting themselves into, and I’m sure they agree
that Sturm has certainly seen better days.
Controversy has plagued Sturm’s recent fights against British
fighters, Matthew Macklin and Martin Murray, with Macklin scoring a close points
defeat whilst the British press cried “Bloody Murder” after the Murray-Sturm
fight was called a draw.
Thirty six of Sturm’s forty one fights have taken place in
Germany, with three in Hungary and one in Croatia. Sturm has only fought on one
occasion in America, in which he suffered defeat at the hands of the great,
Oscar De La Hoya by unanimous decision in a tight encounter for the WBO
Middleweight Title.
Twenty seven of Geale’s fights have taken place at home in
Australia, with the only fight away from home being the world title win in
Germany against Sylvester, ensuring Sturm is by far the more comfortable on
Sunday.
There is no denying the talents of Sturm. He is coming off a
fourteen fight undefeated streak, which has included names such as Macklin,Zbik,
Murray, Castillejo, Pittman and the man Geale wrestled the title from, fellow
German, Sebastian Sylvester.
But Sturm’s career has never been considered truly great,
given his desire not to fight outside Germany. There were reports that Anthony
Mundine had offered great sums to lure Sturm to Australia some years ago, but
the Mundine Camp was promptly told a fight would only take place on German
soil.
Geale has been criticised for not having the knockout power
of the likes of Sergio Martinez and Chavez Junior, but Geale’s knockout
percentage of 53.57% far outweighs that of Sturm, who at 39.02%, is the one
with the inability to spark out his opponents. Geale has the crushing knockout
of Roman Karmazin fresh in the mind, and I feel only his fractured hand has
prevented him from adding to his knockout record in his past two fights.
Whilst Geale may need a knockout in Germany on Sunday, he is
more than equipped to get the job done on decision. Geale has a solid jab and
moves well, but he can have a tendency to rush forward in an attempt to start
at a fast tempo. Geale has been to the canvas on four occasions in his career,
with the last against Mundine, and will need to remain composed under the
bright lights in Germany.
Australian Boxing legend, Jeff Fenech is on record as saying
Geale is a better fighter than both Mundine and Green, and victory on Sunday
morning will certainly eradicate both of the formers resume’s to the periphery.
Victory on Sunday in Germany will finally launch Geale into
the Boxing stratosphere that his talents deserve and the Australian Boxing
public will finally see that he is in fact, “The Real Deal”.
