Kambosos v Lomachenko Preview

This month has been one of the best months of boxing in living memory.

 

Last week, Canelo Alvarez beat Jaime Mungia up for 12 rounds on his usual Cinco De Maio coronation as the King of Boxing.

 

Earlier this week he had Naoya Inoue show some level of vulnerability for the first time in his life, before ultimately knocking Luis Nery out and remaining the undisputed super bantamweight champion. In the process of that dominant display, he retook his crown as the number 1 fighter in the world pound for pound.

 

This Sunday we have Australian George Kambosos fighting Vasiliy Lomachenko for the IBF lightweight title vacated by Devin Haney, who was recently beaten by an overweight and steroid enhanced Ryan Garcia in one of the most bizarre and memorable bouts in recent history.

 

Next weekend we have the main course. Tyson Fury v Oleksandr Usyk for the undisputed heavyweight championship of the world, but I’ll write about that next week.

 

For now, we’re focusing on fighting pride of Australia - before Tim Tszyu became the fighting pride of Australia - George Kambosos and his bout with Ukraine’s public enemy number one Vasiliy Lomachenko.

 

(This is a remarkable piece on the public opinion of Lomachenko in Ukraine, which has dramatically diminished as he is perceived as a shill for the Russian regime and largely an apologist for their aggression)

 

Inside the ropes, styles make fights. They’re a good matchup for each other given their fast hands and mutual desire to press the action. It should make for an exciting fight that will probably end with the judge’s scorecards being read out given the lack of power that either man is bringing to the bout.

 

Let’s start with Kambosos, who deserves a mountain of credit for brining Devin Haney and now Vasiliy Lomachenko to Australian shores. He fought Haney in Melbourne twice, and is now fighting Lomachenko in Perth. Those are two fighters of international repute coming to our shores, so good on him.

 

As a fighter, Kambosos is not as dumb as he looks.

 

If we’re in the trust tree, Kambosos looks like the archetype of a dumb fighter who has got this far in his career on the strength, basically, of his chin and pressure.

 

In part, that’s true. But his pressure is calculated, rather than constant. He knows when to press the action and when to work on the outside. Even if his punch timing leaves a bit to be desired, he is good at timing when to turn up the heat on his opponents with pressure and volume. His career highlight against Teofimo Lopez was a lesson in this calculated aggression against a bigger puncher.

 

Ultimately, Kambosos wants to make his way inside so he can put his fast hands to work. If he can’t do that, essentially, he can’t win as we saw against Devin Haney (twice).

 

He’s not a terribly complicated or nuanced fighter, but he has maxed out his ability and his earning, parlaying his win against Teofimo Lopez into an impressive career.

 

Lomachenko, on the other hand, is a genius.

 

Generally speaking genius beats “smarter than he looks”.

 

Even at his advanced age, he showed in his razor thin decision loss to Devin Haney that he’s still a good enough athlete to fly around the ring creating angles of attack that other fighters couldn’t dream of. 

 

He drowns his opponents in feints, level changes, angle changes and volume, though that has dropped off as he has aged and moved up in weight somewhat.

 

Lomachenko has perfect footwork as a southpaw and is always on balance despite the fact that he flies around like a bee, looking to sting from angles that opposition fighters didn’t know they could conceivably be stung. 

 

He also almost always remains defensively responsible, despite his volume and activity. Given the amount of time Lomachenko spends in the pocket, it is remarkable how few times he has been cleanly hit. 

 

Fighting him must be like fighting a matador, especially for a bull like Kambosos.

 

Against Haney, Lomachenko went against type and let Haney lead the dance and worked as a counterpuncher who used his angles to counterpunch.

 

I suspect that Lomachenko will take a similar tack in this fight. He will let Kambosos walk into the traps that he sets, and punish him while he’s there.

 

Even at 36 years old and after over 400 amateur and pro fights, Lomachenko is still too good for Kambosos.

 

Boxing math doesn’t work in this way, but it’s worth considering how these two men fared against Devin Haney.

 

Kambosos lost 24/24 rounds against Haney. Haney kept Kambosos at the end of his jab and barely broke a sweat in either. While Kambosos is smarter than he looks, he’s not as smart or as good as Haney.

 

Lomachenko, on the other hand, arguably won his fight against Haney.

 

He was able to adjust to Haney’s non-traditional gameplan that focussed on right hands to the body, which initially troubled Lomachenko, and came home with a wet sail by smothering Haney’s sweeping right hands to the body and finding his way inside of the bigger man and working from there. He outthought and then subsequently outfought Haney.

 

In hindsight, that fight should have been instructive on Haney’s ability to gameplan pre-fight but not in-fight.

 

But that’s not what we’re talking about.

 

Even though he lost on the scorecards, Lomachenko’s ability to adjust and arguably beat a man who totally obliterated Kambosos must be a relevant data point.

 

So should Kambosos’ disappointing recent fight against Maxi Hughes, which he won on the cards but easily could have lost. It was not a robbery for Kambosos, but it was a much too close fight to truly believe that Kambosos could trouble one of the best boxers that has ever walked this earth, even at 36.

 

Kambosos has a massive heart and won’t quit like Nicholas Walters and Jason Sosa did against Lomachenko. He might even have some early success. But I suspect that Lomachenko will ultimately frustrate Kambosos with his movement ability to swim without getting wet.

 

Prediction: Lomachenko by unanimous decision.