Wayne McCullough says that Chris Arreola showed heart but not enough brain against Vitali Klitschko.
Vitali shows that the Klitschko's are still the men to beat
Last weekend Chris Arreola and Vitali Klitschko fought for Klitschko's WBC heavyweight title at the Staples Center in front of a crowd of about 14,500 loud, pro-Arreola fans.
Arreola was hoping to become the first fighter of Mexican descent to claim a heavyweight title.
Klitschko was making history of his own by being the first fighter ever to headline a card for the third time at the Staples Center in Los Angeles - even though Oscar de la Hoya is the fighter immortalised in bronze with a statue outside.
For Arreola, weight was a factor. I think if he had come in around the 230-240lbs range he would have had a better chance, but in his last few fights he had weighed in closer to 260lbs. During his earlier career he had fought at or around 230lbs and he was a faster fighter then.
For this fight he stepped on the scales at 251lbs and Klitschko was 252lbs but in much better shape, his body more defined.
Arreola began the fight standing right in front of the taller Klitschko. Constant left jabs were landing to his face and even though they weren't that hard, they looked good and were scoring shots.
Klitschko's plan was to stay at a distance, punch and move. It worked well. Arreola was walking straight in, looking for that one big shot that would score him a KO. But as the rounds passed it was getting clearer that the KO punch wasn't going to come because Arreola was only averaging 30 punches per round compared to Klitschko's 80 or more.
Getting away with it
It appears as though Klitschko does everything wrong. He exposes his chin and stands with his hands down by his side but he is so big he seems to be able to get away with it. He wasn't looking for the KO. He was just winning the rounds. His uppercuts were landing as were his body shots and rights to the head.
A few right hands from Arreola hit his target but there were no combinations of four or five shots behind them. He held his hands high in defence but left his body wide open.
Arreola did block some punches but didn't counter after his opponent stopped punching so Klitschko started punching again and most of his shots did land. Arreola might have won the eighth round but apart from that he was being schooled.
In the ninth Klitschko was landing punches with no reply. Arreola's manager was back and forth to the corner talking to his trainer and corner men and I believe he was advising them to pull Arreola out. After the 10th round, when it was evident that he had taken enough, his corner stopped the fight.
Lessons to be learnt
Arreola showed heart and didn't really get hurt, apart from his pride. His face, however, illustrated the frequency of Klitschko's landing jabs. He is still young and if he makes the proper changes he can bounce back but he must adjust big time in order for that to happen.
He needs to improve his conditioning and learn better skills from a new trainer. Those are the two most important elements he must amend.
Klitschko demonstrated that he and his brother Wladimir are sill the kings of this division and they will be hard to beat unless someone has a good gameplan to defeat them.
