WBA light heavyweight champion Dmitry Bivol will not defeat unified champion Artur Beterbiev without standing and fighting his man on October 12. Bivol (23-0, 12 KOs) won’t be able to hold off Beterbiev (20-0, 20 KOs) by turning the fight into a 12-round track event.
Beterbiev cuts off the ring too well for Bivol to get away with moving, and he can’t afford to exhaust himself by staying on the move for an entire fight. Bivol is 33 and not young enough to move for three minutes in each round.
Bivol against Beterbiev will be shown live on DAZN PPV from the Kingdom Arena in Riyadh. The oddsmakers have Bivol as the favorite because of his youth, boxing skills and the fact that Beterbiev is coming off a knee injury.
“This is an incredible fight for my career. Boxing fans want to see this fight,” said Dmitry Bivol talkSport about his match against Artur Beterbiev. “It’s good that two fighters have different styles. It’s interesting.
“Obviously it helped my career to become more famous. I got a lot of boxing fans out of that fight,” Bivol said of his fight against Canelo Alvarez in 2022. “It was a boundary fight. If we succeed, we can go to another level.”
Fortunately for fans, His Excellency Turki Alalshikh took an interest in the Beterbiev vs. Bivol fight because we may never have seen it happen because of the networks and promoters.
“I have nothing on my mind after October 12. Just this fight for belts, and then we’ll see. I knew this fight would happen sooner or later,” Bivol said about his fight against Beterbiev.
“This should be a classic. I have described it as the light-heavyweight version of Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier. It’s how close they are and how well they fit,” said journalist Colin Hart Pro Boxing Fans. “Beterbiev is a beast when he gets in that ring. He’s 39, and he shouldn’t be where he is at 39.”
Bivol doesn’t fight like the version of Muhammad Ali that Joe Frazier first fought, and Beterbiev is totally different from Frazier. If anyone, Bivol fights a lot like a younger version of Vladimir Klitschko before he started training with Emanuel Steward.
When Wladimir was young, he was a combination puncher who moved a lot. After Steward got a hold on Wladimir, he added a lot of clinch. He kind of became like Lennox Lewis.
“He is undefeated with 20 fights and 20 knockouts. Bivol beat Canelo. That gives you an idea of how good he is. So, flip a coin. I have to believe Beterbiev will win. It will be the first time he has done the distance,” Hart said.
It’s going to be difficult for Bivol to go the full 12 rounds against Beterbiev because he has a lot of bad habits that will create opportunities for him to get knocked out. Bivol’s habits:
- Fight off the ropes: Bivol regularly stands against the ropes and checks to see if he covers up. It worked against guys like Canelo, Gilberto Ramirez and Lyndon Arthur, but I don’t think it will against Beterbiev.
- Throw Combos: This is the biggest flaw in Bivol’s game as he has been a competition puncher from day one. He likes to throw two to four punch combinations and sometimes as many as seven.
“His only strength is his skill. This is what Beterbiev will beat. He is so skilled and so smart,” Hart said of Bivol. “It’s amazing when you think that two Russians are going to headline in Riyadh. It gives you an idea of the difference in boxing now from how it used to be.”
Bivol’s skills may not be enough for him to hold off Beterbiev, who will force him to fight at some point in the contest. He can’t go the entire 12 rounds without standing and trading with Beterbiev without risking losing a decision. The judges are not going to automatically give Bivol rounds if he fights defensively like he did against Lyndon Arthur and Craig Richards. Those fights were hard to watch because Bivol showed no heart.
“This is a fight that people will want to see. I’m not saying that people on the fringes of boxing would say the same thing because I’m pretty sure they don’t know too much about either of them,” Hart said.
Casual fans probably won’t bother watching the Beterbiev vs. Bivol opportunity for purchase DAZN PPV. However, a fair amount will watch it on ESPN+ if they have a subscription and come across it on October 12th.
Casual fans won’t go looking for the event because these are foreign fighters, and the undercard is mostly British guys that even the hardcore won’t have much interest in seeing in the US
