The first two rounds were easy due to Watson's ring rust. When Watson found his range, McCallum was in deep water.
I am with Mr Butt here. Many people (me included) thought Watson would beat old man McCallum. But ring rust and grossly underrating The Bodysnatcher, saw Mike school Watson. Too the point where we turned on Watson, and suggested he had bottled the fight, he had been intimidated by the Jamaican. I do not think that now, and soon realized then, it was Watson's inexperience and McCallum's excellence that was the reason for the borderline mismatch. But have no doubt, Micheal was outclassed that night.
the first two rounds and last few before the stoppage were all McCallum. But most of the fight it was nip-and-tuck in ring centre.
For anyone who knows boxing - there was two different levels of boxer in that ring. it was the honours class and the pass class, no disrespect to Watson at all. McCallum is an all-time-great.
No, McCallum said Steve Collins had the best chin, but he said Michael Watson was unbelievably strong. The strongest he ever faced! McCallum was good that night he used his head to pace himself and land more accurately to steal the rounds, but Watson pressured McCallum and did force him back as he threw a large quantity of punches and he landed a lot of them that night. There was nothing easy about that fight and McCallum said himself Watson gave him hell.
Watson should have beat old McCallum that night, but he was up against it. Watson was inactive as the fight was postponed twice sure meaning Watson was out for over a year before that night. Watson's corner also made late changes to the tactics and told Michael to pressure McCallum and throw lots of shots instead of his normal counterpunching style. If that's not bad enough Watson went into the McCallum fight with a bout of flu and a fractured nose.
Could of, should of... Hindsight shows even a fit active Watson at the time, was not up to McCallum's level.
A fit active Michael Watson would have beat old McCallum, but that was Watsons problem of course. Anyway I was only pointing out why Watson wasn't at his best that night and how it had nothing to do with him bottling the fight or anything like that.
I watched mccallum vs both Collins and Watson both very one sided and mccallum looked far superior to Collins and Watson neither fight was remotely close