The HIGHLY talented former three division world champion Jorge Linares (40-3, 27 KOs) plans on sending WBA World lightweight champion Anthony “Million Dollar” Crolla (31-4-3, 13 KOs) down to defeat this month in 10 days from now on September 24 at the Manchester Arena in Manchester, England.
Linares, 31, says he’s going to ruin the 29-year-old Crolla’s brief title run as the World Boxing Association 135lb champion, and there is absolutely nothing his fans are going to be able to do about it on the night. Just last year, Linares came over to the UK and whipped Kevin Mitchell in front of his own fans in stopping him in the 10th round in London, and now it’s Crolla’s turn to get some of the same bitter medicine shoved down his throat.
“I love fighting in my opponent’s back yard with all the noise that comes with it from their fans,” said Linares. “The supporters cannot get in the ring with their fighter; it’s just me and him.”
Yes, I totally agree with Mr. Linares. It’s just going to be him and Crolla inside the ring on September 24, and there’s nothing that his loyal boxing fans are going to be able to do anything to change the outcome of the fight. Cheering won’t work, because Linares has been a traveler during his career inside the ring, and he’s quite comfortable with fighting on the road in hostile territory. The cheering from boxing fans might actually work against him.
If Crolla tries to fight harder because of the cheering that is being done for him by his fans in the Manchester Arena, it could lead to him walking into one of Linares’ heavy shots and getting knocked out. Linares has the better experience, superior power and dare I say better talent of the two. The only thing that Crolla has going for him is he’s fighting at home in Manchester, which means that each time he lands a shot, the place is likely going to erupt with cheering from his faithful.
In turn, the judges, being human, will likely use the applause as a cue to score the rounds for Crolla. I hate to say it, but I think that’s the only reason you could explain the oddball scoring from last Saturday’s match between IBF/IBO/WBA/WBC middleweight champion Gennady “GGG” Golovkin and Kell Brook at the O2 Arena in London. You had just scoring the fight three rounds to one for Brook, and even giving him the 1st round where he was knocked silly by Golovkin. The two other judges had the fight dead even at two rounds a piece.
I would have loved to have seen the scoring for the three judges if the fifth round had ended without Brook’s trainer Dominic Ingle throwing in the towel, because then it would have been just academic that the scoring was hilariously bad if the three judges have given the 5th to Brook. I mean, two of the judges had Brook winning the 1st despite him being badly hurt by Golovkin. Linares isn’t planning on letting the judges have a say so in the final outcome of their fight on September 24, because he plans on knocking him out to make sure that he walks out of the area on the night with his WBA title belt slung over his shoulder like a battlefield trophy.
“When I first started to fight all over the world it took some time to adjust but now, it’s easy and I am confident doing it,” said Linares.
Linares will be taking a nine-fight winning streak into the ring with him against Crolla in this fight. The last time that Linares suffered a loss was four years ago when he was stopped in the 2nd round by the hard hitting Sergio Thompson in March 2012. It’s funny how boxing works. While Linares’ career has turned around completely with him winning the World Boxing Council lightweight title not long ago, Thompson’s career has tanked with him losing to Takashi Miura and Bryan Vasquez. Thompson hasn’t fought since his loss to Vasquez in December 2014, and it’s unclear whether he’ll ever return to the ring or not.
Crolla has won seven out of his last ten fights with three of his matches ending in draws in fights against Darleys Perez, Gamaliel Diaz and Derry Mathews. Crolla was quite fortunate not to be given losses in his fight against Perez in July 2015 and in his match against Mathews. I saw both fights and I had Crolla losing them both. Crolla’s fight against Perez was very strange, as the referee took off points from Perez in the 11th and 12th.
Crolla was clearly behind in the fight, and those two point deductions saved him from losing. On the second point deduction, Crolla pulled Perez’s head down with both hands while he was throwing the punch, and he was still deducted a point. I thought Perez should have won the fight even with the point deductions, and I definitely had Derry Mathews beating Crolla. He’s been very, very lucky with the scoring in his fights.
Crolla defeated Perez by a 5th round in their rematch in November 2015 to win the WBA lightweight title. In Crolla’s first defense, he defeated 33-year-old Ismael Barroso by a 7th round knockout last May. Barroso ran out of gas after five rounds, and was taken out by Crolla. Despite his advancing age, Barroso did not look like an experienced fighter that had been around the block. He just looked like a guy that could hit hard.
in his fights against Barroso and Perez, Crolla was able to get over with his body punching rather than his power. Against Linares, Crolla is going to need to find some new tool to use because body punching is not going to work. In fact, it might lead to Crolla getting knocked out if he tries to beat Linares with that tool. Linares is a pure boxer, who stays on the out and works over his opponents with slashing shots. Linares doesn’t fight stupid by backing up against the ropes like we saw with Perez.