Dogged performance by late replacement gives champion an unexpectedly hard test
Anthony Joshua successfully defended his WBA and IBF titles in Cardiff last night, but it proved a far harder task than anyone could have predicted. The 37-year-old Cameroonian-French fighter Carlos Takam, a late replacement for Kubrat Pulev, the Bulgarian who withdrew because of injury, proved a gutsy and spirited opponent, ignoring cuts to both eyes before a controversial stoppage by referee Phil Edwards, in the tenth round.
At the fights conclusion, the loudest sound in the Cardiff night air was probably Joshua’s sigh of relief. Although the Champion was never seriously troubled, the defiance and durability of Takam gave Joshua no peace at all, and plenty to think about.
It was an admirable effort by Takam, who was cheered loudly afterwards. His bravery and grit was ultimately rendered futile by the stoppage, a decision that many observers felt came too soon, robbing Takam of the chance of being carried out on his shield.
Joshua weighed in at a career heaviest 18st 2lbs for the fight, a surprise after his promoter Eddie Hearn had predicted a much lighter Joshua, pre-fight. The weight looked to be no issue whatsoever on Joshua’s sculpted frame, although only he will know if it had any effect on his performance and stamina.
As they came together in the ring, Takam looked more like a Cruiserweight compared to the giant Joshua. Takam’s late call-up certainly posed a tactical rethink for the Joshua camp, who’d prepared solidly to face a much taller man in the shape of Pulev, who at 6ft 4in was far more akin to Joshua’s height than Takam’s 6ft 1 ½ in.
As soon as the first bell sounded, we could see Joshua’s problem. Punching downwards to a far shorter opponent, the leverage offered when tackling a fighter of a similar size was lost. Takam was by necessity punching upwards, so neither man had the ideal foe opposite him.
Round one was comfortably Joshua’s, he looked a study of concentration as he tried to settle into a rhythm. It was cagey, but AJ jabbed effectively and commanded the centre of the ring. Round two, however, was far less serene for Joshua – after an exchange of blows, Takam’s head bobbed up and cracked Joshua squarely on the nose. Ouch. Joshua recoiled in obvious discomfort and a broken nose was suspected – although subsequent reports deny it was broken, just badly bruised.
It was, however, a clear concern for Joshua who shifted up a couple of gears immediately, he looked like he wanted to get rid of Takam before the nose injury worsened. Interestingly, Joshua’s corner were heard to ask Referee Edwards to tell Takam to watch what he was doing with his head, swiftly followed by them telling their own man to calm down a bit. We now had a fight taking a different and more interesting direction, although I doubt Joshua – and his throbbing nose – saw it that way.
Round three proved uneventful, Joshua clearly heeding his corners advice, and Takam still searching for something offensive to offer from his armoury, which was looking fairly weak in the attacking sense. His obduracy and determination, however, were plain to see.
Into the fourth – and not good news for Takam. Despite some bravado early on, when he smiled and shrugged off a decent a right hand from Joshua, a deep cut opened on Takam’s right eye, courtesy of a Joshua hook. Immediately it looked a bad one, and Takam sensed it. Suddenly, he went for it, big style. A big left hand from Takam – and was that a slight wobble from AJ, after the shot landed?
But Joshua hit back with some venom of his own with a short, sharp flurry of shots, followed by a short left that put the challenger down. It was the briefest of knockdowns, and whilst clearly caused by a clean shot, Takam was keen to show the world that he wasn’t badly hurt by it.
Takam probably realised he was lagging behind on points already, with the cut making things far worse for him. But his determination was impressive. As the fifth got under way, Takam was repeatedly dabbing his cut with his gloves. The white wrist area of his right glove was now a deep shade of crimson, as the blood seeped steadily from the nasty wound. A Doctor was summoned to check out the extent of the damage – to Takam’s relief he was cleared to carry on fighting.
Both fighters exchanged words and grins as they appeared to take a slight breather. Was Joshua looking slightly leggy at this point? he was getting too close at times to Takam – a necessity caused by the height difference – and it was helping Takam to both hold and to land his own shots. With his shorter reach, this was a significant bonus for Takam. Sportingly, they touched gloves at the end of the round.
Joshua got serious in the sixth, landing a peach of a right uppercut, which slowed Takam noticeably. He seemed to feel the effects of it for the entire round, and sadly for Takam the contest was slipping away from him. Despite his impressive resistance, to this observer Joshua was yet to lose a single round.
To make Takam’s life worse, he suffered another cut to the other eye this time, in the next round. Both eyes were now bleeding heavily, splattering the canvas quite spectacularly. The damage was done this time with Joshua measuring Takam up with a left, followed by a straight right that was bang on the money – no wonder Takam’s eyebrow was no match for Joshua’s leather with this shot. More verbals were shared. But was Joshua labouring? He looked slightly open-mouthed – never a good sign.
Round eight was less eventful – a decent right/left from Joshua being returned in kind by Takam being the highlight. The blood-stained towel on Takam’s lap as he sat in his corner was testimony to the gory state of his eyes – it wasn’t pretty, and despite the best efforts of his corner, the flow of blood showed no signs of letting up. It looked bad.
Consequently, prior to the start of the ninth, the Doctor was once again called upon to check Takam’s ability to continue. Again, he was allowed to carry on. Joshua did nothing spectacular in the round, his best punch being a good right which Takam took with disdain. In fact Takam threw the better shots and probably edged the round. He was, however, still wiping the blood from his face with worrying regularity.
The denouement of an absorbing contest was a massive disappointment to Takam and his followers. Early in the tenth he was busy, but nothing that unduly troubled AJ. Despite the trouble caused by the cuts, he was certainly still in the contest. But with 1 minute and 45 seconds to go, Joshua unleashed a left/right combination, full of percussive power. Takam was hurt, his legs wobbled. Joshua followed up with a similar salvo, and the crowd roared their approval.
Joshua’s shots were good, no doubt. But Takam didn’t go down, he was taking them. However, referee Phil Edwards decided that Takam had received enough punishment, and stepped in to stop the contest. Takam was distraught, clearly believing he was not in any serious trouble and capable of defending himself.
It was a sad end to a fantastically determined and fearless challenge by Takam. Did he deserve to end the fight on his feet, albeit doomed to a loss on points? Most certainly. But can we really blame the referee for putting Takam’s safety and well-being first – at least in his opinion? Of course not. Stoppages often court controversy and sadly this was no exception. But ultimately, surely, safety is paramount. As Tony Bellew, commentating on Sky TV said – “Takam’s been saved to fight another day”.
It created a strange mood immediately after the fight. Joshua’s fans were clearly delighted with the win – especially as it was a fight that proved far trickier than anyone expected. But there was also a sense of frustration clearly evident – probably a hybrid of feeling the fight should have been allowed to reach a natural conclusion, and growing appreciation of Takam’s surprisingly defiant and brave performance.
Joshua was certainly not crowing afterwards – but that’s hardly his style anyway. Anybody who is familiar with Takam says he is a genuinely great guy, and what we witnessed last night not only concurred with that, but perhaps more importantly, confirmed him as an indisputably valiant, steely fighter who has no conception of a reverse gear and what they may have been invented for.
Joshua, as he usually does, spoke well after the fight.
“I came to fight. I don’t sit on the edge and make decisions. I have no interest with what’s going on with the Officials, that’s not my job. My job is to worry about my opponent. I was watching him, I was trying to break him down, round-by-round, and, unfortunately, the ref stopped it before I could….” finish the job, was his unspoken conclusion to the sentence.
“I think people wanted to see Takam unconscious on the floor…am I right?” At which point Joshua turned to the crowd, who cheered in return.
“OK, OK…now I understand, now I understand.” he said. “And that’s what I was trying to get to, ten rounds, eleven rounds, twelve rounds – we were getting there. But as I said, I didn’t have control over the ref’s decision. We get the win, and now we move onto a positive 2018”.
Asked by Sky about his 2018 plans, Joshua said he’d get his nose fixed (or not, as more recent reports suggest), and to grow the sport of boxing. And what about a unification bout with the great American dream, one Mr Deontay Wilder? “It has to happen…it has to happen for sure”, was Joshua’s reply – music to the ears of every boxing fan on the planet.
But, always on message, Joshua also mentioned the mandatory obligations that come with defending any world title – “I have to fight championship fighters”. When Joshua’s promoter Eddie Hearn was interviewed he confirmed that well-known fact – “Tonight was mandatory – you fight that fight or you lose that belt”.
And Carlos Takam? He received warm and enthusiastic applause from the Cardiff crowd, and deservedly so. He also spoke well, his brevity and unfamiliarity with English hardly diluting his class and integrity.
“Anthony is a great champion, I respect him. The UK crowd is a great crowd – I want a re-match”. And who could argue with him? He was a last-minute replacement (albeit one who was nominated first reserve and in full training), who presented a far tougher obstacle to Joshua than many fans and Bookmakers predicted, pre-fight.
So, what to make of Joshua’s first defence? It has to be said the substitution of Takam was a major change from the height and style of Pulev, who was far more suitable for Joshua. But the truth remains there are few prople who would have predicted a contest lasting ten rounds.
Did Joshua look a bit flat? Was the extra weight a hindrance? Was his punching power exposed – at least on this occasion – as rather ordinary? Some critics were not slow in expressing their concerns and after the fight. But the record books will forever show a win by TKO, albeit much later in proceedings than many had predicted.
Only Joshua and his team will know whether there are any concerns with their man, or whether this fight was merely an unexpectedly harder challenge than envisaged. Carlos Takam’s performance and durability certainly took many of us by surprise.
Whilst the current heavyweight scene has several fighters scrapping for their place at the top table, the fight the world most wants to see in this division is of course Joshua v Wilder. America’s WBC Champion recently made short work of the Haitian-Canadian Bermane Stiverne inside a round with his latest defence. However, as impressive as Wilder’s power was, it has to be said Stiverne looked decidedly over-weight and under-interested, which is never a good combination.
New Zealand’s Joseph Parker (WBO Champion), is of course fully in this picture, although his profile remains considerably lower than Wilder’s. Sadly, Wladimir Klitschko’s name no longer figures in the mix. The brilliant and classy Ukrainian deciding in August to call time on his fantastic career at the ripe old age of 41. Now there is a man who will be truly missed.
Kubrat Pulev, Joshua’s scheduled opponent last night, was the IBF’s nominated No. 1 challenger before injury struck, so his place in the pecking order will need to be re-calibrated once he’s fit again, although within the rankings (and politics) of boxing, things can move quickly, and the Bulgarian may just have missed his big chance, at least for the time being.
British interest here is high of course, Liverpool’s Tony Bellew, the former WBC world cruiserweight world champion who recently moved up to heavyweight, gives Londoner David Haye (a former WBA world heavyweight champion, let us not forget) a rematch next month, after Bellew’s headline-grabbing win last March – albeit massively helped by Haye’s achilles tendon rupture on the night.
Jamaican-born Dillian Whyte, who gave Joshua a big scare when they fought in 2015, is looking for a breakthrough fight and is currently ranked number one challenger to Wilder by the WBC.
Then we have the “Marmite” that is Tyson Fury, who appears to be considering a comeback in 2018, although he is still officially unlicensed as a boxer. The Fury story has a few remaining directions possible, predicting which one he’s likely to take is difficult, and probably as yet unknown even to the man himself.
So the Joshua bandwagon continues. As a contest, his victory over Takam clearly didn’t have the status, quality or excitement as his triumph over Klitschko, but it was ultimately job done, and another step closer to a showdown with Deontay Wilder. Joshua perhaps wasn’t on top form in this one, but surely we’ve seen enough of him by now to believe he can go to become Britain’s greatest ever heavyweight. A unification fight with Wilder is looking increasingly like it could be career-defining for Joshua. Let’s hope nothing derails what will be one of the most anticipated sporting events of 2018.
By Chris Tribe
29th October 2017
Copyright © 2017 Chris Tribe. All Rights Reserved.
Photo credit: Pierre-Yves Beaudouin / Wikimedia Commons /
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