By: Sean Crose
You don’t have be a part of the live, in-person audience to hear the punches thud as they land on his opponents. The sound travels clear across broadcast technology, the drumming of leather hitting flesh with great power and a great speed, concussing, damaging, ruthless. The sound can be heard clearly thousands of miles outside the ring. And those who hear and see those punches know without doubt that junior middleweight Tim Tszyu is a delivery system of menace. This Saturday in Las Vegas, however, the 24-0 Aussie son of boxing royalty might well be facing a delivery system of menace himself.
For Tszyu, the son of Hall of Famer Koysta Tszyu, will be taking on the towering 6.5 feet tall, 20-1-1 Sebastian Fundora in the main event of Amazon Prime Video’s first Pat Per View Card this Saturday night in Las Vegas. The 29 year old Tszyu was supposed to take on the popular – if not particularly active – former welterweight titlist Keith Thurman this weekend, but a Thurman injury meant the 26 year old Fundora would now face Tszyu instead – with a roughly eight inch height advantage at his disposal. Not that Tszyu appears to be unnerved. He’s an icy customer, Tszyu, a man confident in his ability to physically vanquish an opponent.
“I know what to do wit southpaws,” he told Sporting News Australia about facing tall southpaw Fundora. “I know how to fight tall guys anyways. It’s all about adjusting and I feel the adjustments have been made.” And how long did it take to successfully make those adjustments? “One day?” he asked almost rhetorically. “Two hours? Yeah, it was one session.” When asked what he intends to do on Saturday, Tszyu’s words become menacing. “Hurt him,” he said. “Hurt him. Bad.” To the undefeated Tszyu, it’s all as simple as that. “That’s the plan, man,” he said. “Someone in the crowd’s going to catch a head flying.”
Fundora might well agree…except on whose head it may be soaring outside the ring. Like Tszyu, Fundora’s taken this fight on short notice. Both men are heading into uncharted territory here. Indeed, many – if not most – feel like Fundora poses a greater threat to Tszyu than Thurman did. With the WBC and WBO junior middleweight titles at stake, there’s a lot on the line for each fighter thesis weekend. Among the many things that could be said about this matchup, “uninteresting” isn’t one of them.
