He Needed A Week To Recover”: Heavyweight ‘Smashed’ And ‘Knocked Out’ Oleksandr Usyk In Sparring

A number of men have claimed to have hurt Oleksandr Usyk in sparring.

 

Importantly, no one has ever managed to do so in the ring. The Ukrainian is a 2012 Olympic Gold Medalist who then went on to become the undisputed cruiserweight king in 2018, and by May of this year, he had also repeated that feat up at heavyweight by beating Tyson Fury on points over 12 close rounds.

He has never lost in the professional ring despite also facing the likes of Derek Chisora, current IBF belt holder Daniel Dubois and former two-time champion Anthony Joshua on two separate occasions. Next up is a rematch with Fury in December of this year.

One man who has often spoken of the damage he inflicted on Usyk is Congolese heavyweight Martin Bakole, who considers himself the most avoided boxer on the planet.

 

He has put together a good run of results in recent times stopping Carlos Takam back in October 2023, and more recently stepping up and knocking out highly rated American prospect Jared Anderson.

 

He thinks it is his performances in sparring that mean he has struggled to make big fights in the paid ring, not least against Usyk, as he told talkSPORT.com.

 

“I don’t lie, I don’t like to lie. I always tell the truth. If you watch BOXXER’s video you will see. I was live on Sky Sports and Oleksandr Usyk’s manager came behind me and said ‘This guy is going to be world champion tomorrow’ because he knows, who I am, he was in the gym when I gave Usyk a hard time.”

Usyk never even touched me, I smashed him and knocked him out. I knocked him out with a body shot. I was getting out of the ring and they said he will need one week to recover.”

 

He then revealed why he talks about sparring stories when the general rule is that a boxer should not.

People are telling me not to talk about sparring but people forget I’m from Africa and it’s very hard for me to sell tickets so I need to sell myself. This is the reason why I accepted to spar with these guys because after I spar with them, I give them a hard time, people talk about me and they get to know about me. It is a very big risk I took because now nobody wants to fight me because they know who I am in the gym.

Ask anyone about me. Go ask Daniel Dubois about me, ask Joshua about me, ask Usyk about me, ask Tyson Fury about me, they will keep quiet. Nobody will say they gave me a hard time. I gave them all a hard time. I stopped Daniel Dubois twice, stopped Joe Joyce and Joshua oh, that was a big one, he was hurt that day.