By Michael Collins: In a battle of recent former heavyweight title challengers, Dereck Chisora (15-4, 9 KO’s) might be facing #8 WBC Manuel Charr (22-1, 12 KO’s) in a still to be determined venue in Germany in March. The Charr-Chisora fight should be an interesting fight if it happens because both fighters can pack a punch but are unfortunately too deeply flawed to capture a world title at this time. Both fighters are crude brawlers so this should be an appealing fight for boxing fans that like to see a lot of slugging.
Perhaps this will change in the future when the Klitschkos both retire, but for now Chisora and Charr are outsiders looking in at the world title honors.
What’s interesting about this fight is that both Charr and Chisora both fought WBC heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko this year in title challenges, and both of course were beaten. Chisora did a much better job against Vitali compared to Charr, who was blown out in only four rounds after suffering a bad cut. However, Chisora fought a much different Vitali than the one that Charr faced.
Vitali injured his shoulder in the 2nd round against Chisora and was forced to fight the remainder of the fight just using his right hand. It was more than enough to easily win a 12 round unanimous decision, but Chisora’s pressure had the 41-year-old Vitali badly out of breath in the last rounds of the fight. Chisora rarely landed anything but his pressure had Vitali gasping for breath. Unfortunately that’s the only victory that Chisora was able to get from this fight because he was way out of his class and couldn’t compete.
Charr is an all-out puncher with a style similar to an old time type fighter from the 50s. He has no defensive skills to speak of and he gets hit a lot in his fights. Charr likes to rush at his opponents to try and KO them with flurries. It’s an effective style when facing weak 2nd tier opposition, but it’s less effective against quality fighters as we saw in his fight with Vitali.
In his last fight, Charr destroyed journeyman Konstantin Airich last Friday night by blowing him out in the 1st round. It was classic Charr with him storming after Airich at the opening bell, burying him with punches until he dropped for the 10 count. Was it impressive? No. It was effective in that he got Airich out of there in a hurry without having to take his big shots in return. Whether that same kind of approach will work with Chisora remains to be seen.
Chisora was stopped in the 5th round in his last fight in July by David Haye. Chisora looked fat in that fight like hadn’t trained properly. You have to wonder why Chisora didn’t look his best because he was in much better condition for his fight with Vitali. If he can’t up for a fight with Haye then you have to wonder how he’ll get motivated for a fight against a less popular fighter in Charr.
Chisora should be able to win this fight because he’s the bigger puncher of the two, and he’s fought at a higher level than Charr when he’s stepped it up. Chisora gave both Robert Helenius and Vitali big problems, and we saw how Charr was way out of his depth against Vitali.