08.12.06 – By Kirk Allen: On Saturday night at the ExCel arena, in London, England, Audley Harrison, (20-2, 15 KO’s) once considered one of Englands’s most promising heavyweights, will be fighting for what’s left of his shattered career when he seeks revenge against Danny Williams, (36-5, 29 KO’s) a fighter that decisioned him a year ago in December, thus starting Audley’s career freefall. The fight itself was nothing to speak of, with both fighters often looking dreadful, rarely throwing punches and posing the whole time, as if they were waiting for their photos to be taken..
The fight was pretty much up in air there until the 10th round, when Williams, 33, landed a wild right hand, seemingly thrown with his eyes closed, that dropped the 6’5″ Harrison to the canvas. While Harrison was able to make it up, he wasn’t capable of mounting any offensive return fire to over come the knockdown.
Afterwards, Harrison, a former 2000 Super heavyweight Olympic gold medalist, looked pitiful, as he made excuses for the loss, suggesting he would be making up for in his next bout. However, that was not to be the case, as Harrison would go to lose his next fight, a 10 round shellacking by fringe heavyweight Dominick Guinn, who controlled virtually every minute of the bout.
That fight, more than the one against Williams, seemed to indicate that Audley was finished as fighter, at least in terms of being viable contender from my lookout. On both occasions, Harrison looked fainthearted when he was met with the slightest hostility, and would retreat backwards, pawing out his long right hand, used in effort to ward off the attack. In effect, it looked like a school child trying to ward off the blows of a bully. However, the sight of it was odd to say the least, since in both fights, Harrison was much bigger than Williams and Guinn, and arguably more skilled, yet for some reason, Audley was afraid to fight back. Oh, how the mighty have fallen.
Upon turning professional in 2001, after winning the Olympic gold the previous year, it seemed that Harrison was destined to be a heavyweight champion of the world. Some even went so far as to say that Harrison would eventually be the undisputed heavyweight champion. Of course, most of the people that were on the Audley bandwagon were from his own country, but that’s par for the course, isn’t it? As an American, I personally thought Audley had a lot of potential, mostly because of his Southpaw stance combined with his powerful left uppercut, both of which made him very tough to beat. The way he breezed through the Olympics, I thought his success would continue well into his professional career.
Certainly, nothing made me think different of him as I watched Audley win his first 19 fights. Perhaps, though, the warning signs were already there, like, for instance, the lazy manner in which Audley fought, as if he didn’t really seem engaged. I wasn’t too concerned at the time, because he was knocking everyone for the most part. Besides, the Klitschko brothers both fought in that same lazy manner, and the public didn’t seem to mind too much.
Whatever the case, it’s difficult to tell whether Harrison’s problem started as a result of his loss to Williams, or whether he was always a marginal heavyweight. The overwhelming consensus, it seems, is that Audley wasn’t ready to step it up against Williams, a 1st tier fighter, one with good power. Perhaps, Audley needed a couple of opponents that were closer to 1st tier competition, so that when he got in there with Williams, it wouldn’t have been so overwhelming for him. Nevertheless, at this point, it’s too late for Audley to go back down to lower competition. He’s 35-years old and he doesn’t have a lot of time to waste fighting 2nd tier fighters. If he had the power of someone like George Foreman or Mike Tyson, I wouldn’t feel this way, but unfortunately, Harrison’s power isn’t close to those fighters.
Williams appears to really want this fight, judging on how he looked at the weigh in yesterday. He appears to be in excellent shape, at least for him, and his weight, 267 lbs, is 20 lbs lighter than he weighed in his last bout. a 12-round decision loss to Matt Skelton, fought in July 2006. At that time, both his condition and the way he fought, was troubling, as if had trained on a diet of candy bars and milk shakes. However, Williams has always been a streaky fighter, and often looks poor following a good showing. But, then again, not much is expected of Williams, being that he’s never been thought of as a real talented heavyweight like Audley.
Without a doubt, it’s do or die for Audley. His immediate goal should be to try to be active in there with Williams. If Audley can simply use his jab, and use it often, he has a good chance of beating Williams with it alone. In a nutshell, there’s no mystery about beating Williams, as Vitali Klitschko proved previously, back in December 2004. All that needs to be done is for Audley to let his hands go, and make sure he leans back to avoid Williams’ occasional right hand bomb. If Audley can do that, the fight is his – easy.
I’m going to go out on a limb and choose Audley as the winner of this one. In the last fight, Audley seemed to be the better fighter of the two, despite looking frightened much of the time. This time, however, if Audley can fight at 75% of his potential, that’s more than enough to beat someone in Williams’ class. However, for Audley to win, he’s going to have to stop being lazy and scared and try to throw some punches because if he fails to do so, Williams will win again.