WARD DOMINATES KESSLER TO TAKE WBA BELT
By Michel Joseph

In front of a home crowd, in a fight where he was the decided underdog, against an opponent who had over twice as much professional experience, and against a backdrop of concern about the decline in America’s place in the boxing world, Andre Ward delivered the best performance of his career Saturday night, and was rewarded with his first world title belt.

 

From the opening round of the fight the strategy of both men became apparent: Mikkel Kessler (now 42-2, 32 KO’s) wanted nothing more than to gain a rhythm and feel for the fight so he could begin to execute his typical breakdown of his opponent accordingly.  Ward’s biggest objective was to do everything in his power to keep Kessler from gaining any momentum, and falling into sync or even adapting to the flow of the fight and consequently, that “everything” meant a clinical display in movement.

 

Ward, 25, used his quicker hands and more nimble feet to place him in position to land punches from different angles.   Defensively, Ward showed great upper body and head movement whenever Kessler, 30, was able to catch up to Ward and in range to throw punches – something the Dane had trouble doing as his own footwork was usually not quick enough to put him in such a position against his more athletic American challenger.  Darting in and out, side to side, Ward’s movement, and his ability to fire off punches after stopping on a dime, and then continuing to spring back into motion frustrated the Dane from the opening bell, and as the fight continued, it was evident that Kessler had no answer for Ward’s movement.

 

Kessler’s look of frustration and utter confusion continued to grow as the fight progressed into the middle and later stages.  Though he never relented and was game throughout the bout, he was never really in the fight, and never even attempted to adjust to Ward’s tactics.

 

It did not help Kessler that California referee Jack Reiss, who Kessler’s team protested to being in charge of the bout prior to the fight, allowed a lot of questionable activity during the fight. Among several questionable decisions he made as a referee, Reiss was especially ineffective when the fighters would clinch, as he often chose not to separate them, but allowed Ward to hold with one hand and punch with the other, and one got the sense that the protests of Kessler’s camp prior to the bout would probably be reiterated even louder afterwards – and they were.  You hate to say it, but I haven’t seen a ref allow some of the things that Reiss did since I was watching Hatton get away with his wrestling tactics back in Manchester to the delight of boozy Brits and a clueless or unconcerned ref.

 

And though Kessler and his people are probably justified in their complaints about the referee, make no mistake – it was ultimately Ward’s ability to frustrate Kessler by keeping him from gaining any kind of an offensive rhythm as well as Kessler’s own decision to not use his polished jab that played far bigger roles in the fight’s outcome than any referee.

 

By the end of the bout, Kessler’s face was cut and bruised, from both head-butts and punches, and the ringside physician’s decision to stop the fight midway through the 11th round – after watching a bad cut over Kessler’s eye due to a clash of heads grow even worse, was the right decision.  It in all likelihood saved the Dane from further punishment, and his face from further damage.

 

With the victory, Ward now 21-0, 13 KO’s becomes not only the new WBA super middleweight champion, but likely a favorite now to win the Super Six World Boxing Classic tournament.  “Right now I’m dreaming” said Ward afterwards, although one has to wonder why, because the simple reality after last night is this: if Ward is able to fight as disciplined as Saturday night, utilizing all of his natural abilities to the fullest, it’s hard to see anybody being able to outbox him in the tournament.

 

It’s also safe to conclude that through the tournament’s opening round performances, nobody came close to performing as impressively as Ward did last night.  Just when talk of the growing domination of boxing by European fighters began to take over the theme of the tournament, Andre Ward has now arrived on the elite level of boxing as its newest world champion – a proud American champion at that.

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