Rendall Munroe v Victor Terrazas
Everybody hates that d**n volcano ash, everyone except for Rendall Munroe. The likeable Leicester super-bantamweight has profited from Eyjafjallajökull. While he’s been completing his training , rival Victor Terrazas has endured a four-day journey from his home town of Guadalajara in Mexico to the West Midlands.
“Two-tone” will take any advantage he can get in this WBC eliminator match, not that he needs it on his current form. Having defended the European belt an astonishing six times, Munroe has finally been given a crack at a world champion; all he has to do is overcome Terrazas first.
Having spent all that time travelling Terrazas is going to want to put in a decent performance, after a four-day trek you don’t want to then have a wasted trip; however Munroe will want to send him home more miserable than he must have been after he arrived.
“Vikingo” is something of an unknown quantity in this country, having never fought outside of Mexico. There is no denying he has an impressive record of 25-1-1. His sole defeat came on his debut in 2003, not that that proves a lot. Bernard Hopkins, Alexis Arguello and Miguel Canto, all lost their first fights as well, and they went on to have half-decent careers.
It is always hard to tell with unknown Latin American’s though, it’s not that hard to rig a boxer’s record with tomato-can’s, but Terrazas does look a decent fighter from what has been shown of him. He has 13 victories inside the distance and certainly looks a tough cookie. Vikingo will stay on the outside and cut off the ring throwing strong left and right straights, which is an interesting contrast to Munroe’s rambling southpaw style.
Somewhat alarmingly Terrazas has been sparring with WBC champion Toshiaki Nishioka, the occupant of the WBC title and the challenge for the victor of this match.
One man who will want to see a decent fight is Munroe’s promoter Frank Maloney who has spent £25,000 getting the Mexican over to England, by a combination, of planes, trains, limo’s and cars. Terrazas must be committed because I doubt that there would be many Mexican’s who would be prepared to travel four days to get to Coventry.
At the end of his epic journey Terrazas announced “I'm here to win, I'm strong and I'm ready.”
Clearly a man of few words.
His trainer Hector Garcia chirped in with “We spent almost four days on the journey. We are professionals and we do our best to be here. We know it’s a big show a big fight and the final eliminator meant that even if we had to come swimming we would have done so.”
Munroe looked a touch shaky in his last outing against Simone Maludrottu in November, although he took the unanimous decision he can count himself lucky as it could have easily swung the other way, he never really asserted himself on proceedings.
The main criticism you could have with Munroe is that he doesn’t use his height and power to finish-off fights. He likes to build a victory with calculated shots, but he is huge for a super-bantam, he needs to bully his opponents about more. That’s not to say he needs to come inside, he does tend to do a fair bit of infighting, but he needs to land those big bombs that he is capable of throwing and make his superior size count.
However the Binman has proved time and time again he’s got quality, it doesn’t matter how you win as long as you win and he hasn’t done anything but win for a long time now. He truly deserves a world-title shot and this fight is going to define his career.
There’s been a lot of love floating around, Garcia said of Munroe: “I think it is going to be a great fight and we have a lot of respect for Munroe, we have studied him and we know what to expect from him.”
While Munroe added: “I've got respect for everyone I fight and this is no different. I'm not into running people down or anything like that.”
That’s right; trash-talking has been thrown out before this bout. Munroe doesn’t want to waste his time littering dirty words around. His only concern is making Terrazas look rubbish.
Prediction: Munroe on points
It’s going to be tough, possibly the hardest of Munroe’s career. However he has also waited so long for this opportunity he’s not going to waste it. Expect a better performance than the one against Maludrottu and a tight point’s win for the Leicester man.
Tags: