Boxing

Is Sanders better than Coetzee?

By Colin Nathan

12.03 - South African boxing fans are on an all time high, with Corrie Sanders easily stopping Wladimir Klitschko in two one sided rounds on Saturday night for the WBO heavyweight title. No one expected it lleast of all your scribe, however I did say that he most definately had a punchers chance, which proved to be very correct.

This has to be one of South Africa`s all time greatest upsets in boxing history. It has to rank right up there with Gerrie Coetzee's first round stoppage of Leon Spinks way back in June 1979. No one gave Coetzee a chance to beat the man who had beaten Ali in only his 8th contest, but he ultimately shined and went on to become South Africa's best heavyweights ever. But that now is up for question with the amazing upset win for Corrie Sanders.

Is Sanders indeed better than former WBA champ Gerrie Coetzee?

Now the purists will say, that when Coetzee won his title there were only 2 champions at the time, think about this then, when Coetzee won his title against Michael Dokes back in 1983 the true heavyweight champion was considered to be Larry Holmes at the time. That is absolutely correct then to say that Coetzee was the second best heavyweight in the division.

Back to Sanders, by beating the man considered second best to Lennox Lewis and being rated by the highly respected Ring magazine at number 1, surely Sanders by way of his win is to be now considered number 2?

By these facts, Sanders and Coetzee then match up. Now if Sanders is to beat Lewis, then surely he has the right to call himself the best South African heavyweight of all time. At the moment it really is difficult to separate the two great South African heavyweights.

If one has to chose a winner than it must go to Corrie Sanders on the way that he took the title when no-one gave him a chance of producing the upset. However, having said that it is also very possible that Sanders could very well lose his title in his first defence (like Coetzee) and the victory over Klitschko will look more like a fluke than anything else.

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