Andre S.O.G Ward Appreciation Thread

i fancy JT to beat him next yr!!

 

Is it defo Son of God?

I always thought it was Son Of a Gun.

 

It's definitely son of God. Somebody claimed it was Son of a Gun when I made a thread for Miranda/Ward.

 

Thanks.

So what's your take on Kess then?

Seems to me he may have underestimated Ward.

 

Ward was just too good :conf

Maybe, maybe not. His trainer certainly underestimated Ward having read his quotes, maybe that made for a poor mindset in camp. His trainer underestimated what a task the whole tourny is, he thought it was a walk in the park. I'd like to see him gone.

Kessler looked a bit off compared to the versions that fought Andrade and even Calzaghe, a little slower and lacking sharpness. Inactivity and poor sparring probably contributed to that.

Not to take anything from Ward, he'd probably beat any Kessler with that style of fighting.

 

I have to be honest his Destruction of Kessler converted me

 

i like what I've seen from him so far, thumbs up from me.

 

His trainer was just useless in the corner. I understand the Danish and the interpreter did it spot on, he was just saying **** like 'hit him harder' and 'use the jab to push him back'. Completely useless, the Jack Loew of Denmark.

I've always thought he's a **** trainer to be honest, Kessler never developed anything in the last 5 years or so. He did well to make Kessler into a solid fighter that mastered a lot of the basics but they got complacent rather than trying to master their craft. They never worked on getting him a better left hook or bodywork. They never worked on inside fighting, evidently. They never got a lot of great sparring over the years, they've sparred Bika, Andrade a few others but nothing top notch and he was sparring some Lithuanian prior to going across to the US which sums that aspect up.

 

No southpaw sparring is pretty shoddy to be fair, coupled with the wrong mindset and some hometown reffing on top made things difficult from the off.

The inactivity and routine defences haven't helped and I think things have gone stale. A new trainer with a new approach and I think Kessler is still very live when it comes to winning this tournament.

 

I was going to ask whether the interpreter for Showtime was being lazy or that Olsem was really being that useless.

 

It was on his Facebook, he only knew the Lithuanian by his nickname ! atsch Lithuania has not had a good fighter..like..ever. At the end of the day thats his trainer and managements responsibility, but Kessler is too loyal to these guys which is the problem, just like he was too loyal to Palle for so long until he literally had no alternative.

The worst way of putting how bad his trainer has been is that the Mikkel Kessler of 2004 that fought Manny Siaca is pretty much the Mikkel Kessler of 2009. If you ever have the chance to watch the fight, do so and see for yourself. It's the same fighter on a technical level, only physically can there be a difference.

 

It's probably a little late in the day now. It's sort of like Hatton teaming up with Mayweather late in his career, it always felt like too little too late. Obviously Kessler hasn't had as much wear and tear as Hatton but he has had a lot of injuries, he's 30 and has been set in his ways for a long time so its going to be difficult to diversify as a fighter. That said I'd still advocate a change, simply from a mental perspective I don't think Kessler is quite right and needs to hear a new voice.

The time for this was many years ago, but when you are winning you don't tend to think about change even though thats the best time. There was also an obvious opportunity to do it with the Calzaghe loss and it still didn't happen.

I'm not all down on his trainer though, he moulded Kessler into a world class fighter and did most of the basics pretty well, he was just limited and unforutnately thats reared its head in Kessler too.