WBA featherweight champion Raymond Ford expects challenger Nick Ball to either quit or his trainer throws in the towel to save him when the fight gets out of hand on Saturday night in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
Ford (15-0-1, 8 KOs) feels he’s on another level to Ball (19-0-1, 11 KOs) and will beat him whatever way he wants in their match on the 5 vs 5 event, live on DAZN PPV at the Kingdom Arena.
Ball, 27, hasn’t shown a weak chin during his seven-year professional career, but he hasn’t faced a lot of top-level fighters yet. The only notable guy Ball has faced is WBC featherweight champion Rey Vargas, and he was held to a twelve round draw against him last March.
Ball would have lost that fight to Vargas if the referee hadn’t blown a call in the eighth round and had done a better job of policing his roughhousing tactics. If he’s unable to find success, Ball will likely use similar tactics against Ford.
Hopefully, the fight doesn’t turn into a pure mess like Ball’s last one because that was hard to watch. There was so much fouling going on.
Ford’s Prediction
“Either he will quit, or his trainer will throw in the towel. His trainer has been doing a lot of talking. I really want him to throw in the towel,” said Raymond Ford to BoxNation, predicting a stoppage win against Nick Ball on Saturday.
It’s doubtful that Ford will score a knockout against Ball because he’s not a big enough puncher, and he’ll put himself at risk if he elects to slug with the challenger. Ball is the better puncher of the two and will be right at home in a slugfest.
“100%, he’s going to feel it, yeah. I’m going to make him feel it,” said Ball about his intention of putting a hurting on Ford. “Yeah, definitely,” said Ball when asked if he sees himself knocking out Ford.
“I always knew it would come to this point where I was a world champion, but I don’t know. It’s an unreal feeling,” said Ford to DAZN Boxing on how it feels to be a world champion. “I’ve been working hard my whole life for that moment.
“To finally get here and it paying off, it feels great. The next goal is to keep winning get more titles, and get bigger fights. You never know where life is going to take you. As long as you keep working hard, believing in yourself, and putting your all into whatever you love to do, it can take you real far.
“They’re are probably just looking at my last fight [against Otebek Kholmatov] like, alright, that was an exciting fight. We know, Nick Ball, he’s going to bring pressure. He’s an exciting fighter. We want to see these two guys clash.’
“I guess it just made the most sense for the fans for me and him to be going against each other, especially with him almost being a world champion. It would have been a unification fight.
“I want to go up in different weight classes and fight different champions and fight bigger guys, fight people that they think I can’t beat. So, that’s part of the legacy that I want,” said Ford.
