Beware the sub. One of sport’s most important maxims.
Remember James ‘Buster’ Douglas inflicting a shock defeat on ‘Iron’ Mike Tyson in Tokyo or what Sheringham and Solskjaer did to Bayern Munich in the Champions League final?
Lewis Ritson tonight faces the latest of late substitutes Marek Jedrzejewski in Liverpool. In football terms you would put the Pole down as an 89th-minute arrival onto the field.
Ritson must indeed beware the sub, a man with absolutely nothing to lose, but for ‘The Sandman’ though it’s all about performing.
The 25-year-old is extremely keen to show the boxing world what he can do in the second defence of his WBA inter-continental light-welterweight belt.
After his defeat to Francesco Patera in Newcastle all and sundry queued up to have a pop at the Newcastle star – usually hiding behind the anonymity social media affords with stuff like ‘change trainer’, ‘change weight’ and ‘you’re rubbish’. And they are the printable sentiments.
But tonight at the Exhibition Centre on Matchroom’s JDNXTGEN event he has the chance to demonstrate what he can do.
Ritson did change weight, he’s made the wise move up from lightweight to light-welter, but there was no change of trainer, quite the opposite – instead of spending half the week with Neil Fannan, he is now in Hartlepool all week.
As for being ‘rubbish he is looking forward to putting that one to bed.
There were encouraging signs against German Benitez in London in March, when he outpointed a tough Argentinian.
He’s had a further months with Fannan so does he feel an improvement has been made.
“Definitely,” the Phil Jeffries-managed fighter told punch-lines. “And if you ask the lads I’ve sparred with I think they’d say the same.
“But it’s one thing me and Fanno saying that I am training and sparring great, it’s about doing it in the ring.
“I thought my last performance was better, there were patches when I got it right.
“It started nice and relaxed but then I got into ‘get him out of there mode’ and throwing bombs.
“If you box that way you are bound to tire after five or six rounds.
“We’ve worked on it and it’s in my head what we need to be doing.
“I think people will see the difference this time.”
It’s now more a case of picking the time to throw big rather than throwing big every shot.
“I tried to blast Benitez out and tried to blast Patera out, sometimes I think when you try too hard it doesn’t come,” said the Forest Hall favourite.
“We’re not talking about stuff like that any more, we are going to stick to Fano’s plan.”
Words: Roy Kelly
