Vasyl Lomachenko vs Anthony Crolla: How Brit plans to pull off one of the biggest upsets in boxing history

Never has a British fighter been given as little a chance to win a world title with Lomachenko a 1/100 favourite

The bookies have been savage with their numbers in Anthony Crolla’s fight with Vasyl Lomachenko for the Ukraine’s two lightweight titles on Friday night in Los Angeles.

Crolla has been placed in the sporting outfield, Lomachenko installed at 1-100 for the fight and I can’t ever recall a British boxer being so wide, so dismissed in a world title fight in my years inside the boxing beast. I have sat in awful judgment on too many British boxers as they were slipped from a hand-picked spoon to easy slaughter in mismatches the gambling lords declared more competitive than this fight.

Just over two years ago Crolla was a legitimate world champion, losing his belt to the brilliant Venezuelan Jorge Linares after twelve rounds of a tough, rough and tight fight. Linares had started to find a place in the holy lists of great lightweights, compared with legends; last May Linares was beaten in ten rounds by Lomachenko and that is clearly part of the thinking behind the gambling insult. Crolla is also a full lightweight, Lomachenko a visitor from the lower divisions.

“People are dismissing Ant’s chances and I can see why,” said Joe Gallagher, Crolla’s trainer and a man suited to battling for his fighters on both sides of the ropes. “But, Linares dropped Lomachenko, the scores were tight at the end – every fighter can lose. That is what boxing history tells us.”

Gallagher is right, but the other lesson from history is that all shocks in the boxing ring need to have a few unknown, hidden reasons for the underdog to ruin the night. In other words, the favourite needs to be weight drained, unmotivated, carrying a bad injury, concealing a cut with plastic skin or something similar. Sadly, Lomachenko does not make mistakes other humans in the boxing business make.

Lomachenko has lost once as a professional when in just his second fight he met Orlando Salido for the WBO featherweight title; Salido, a 55-fight veteran, just about knew too much and got a split decision. Since that night Lomachenko has won world titles at three weights, beaten three previously unbeaten fighters and broken several so severely that they quit, turned away or dropped their heads in shame in the corner.

He is altering the unwritten rules and regulations attached to the general praise of great fighters – after just 13 fights, people want to put him with the ten best fighters of all time. Bob Arum, his promoter, has gone further, suggesting that he might just be the greatest boxer of all time. Arum, by the way, promoted Muhammad Ali and Manny Pacquiao and just about every other fighter in the middle fifty years.

Anthony Crolla is fighting against the odds on Friday (Getty)

“I can study films of him, work on things in the gym, but I will find out when the bells sounds,” said Crolla. “I deserve the fight, I can win the fight and I will not quit – he will know he has been in a fight.” Nobody has ever doubted Crolla’s bravery or heart, but Lomachenko clearly as a subtle and nasty way of checking.

In 2016 a Jamaican called Nicholas Walters, who was unbeaten, had been a world champion, was ignored and feared, simply decided after seven rounds to stay on his stall. Lomachenko had slowly and without any pity destroyed him with class, accuracy and a face that never betrays a feeling. A year later another unbeaten world champion, Guillermo Rigondeaux, did the exact same thing after six rounds. Rigondeaux was an excellent fighter, double Olympic Champion, and had started to be referred to as The Great Cuban. And, by the way, Lomachenko made one other world champion that he met in the middle of Rigondeaux and Walters also quit in his corner, his face bowed, a mix of pain and bewilderment visible.

Lomachenko and Crolla battle on Friday (Action Images via Reuters) (Reuters)

Lomachenko has now fought 13 times as a professional and left a lot of damage and damaged fighters in his dreadful and truly impressive wake.

Crolla will try every single thing he has ever mastered in a professional career that started in 2006, will use every trick men like Sid Razak, who finished his career with nine wins and 128 defeats, showed him. Crolla is part of a lost breed of fight-hardened men, boxers developed away from the kindly rainbow of selection. In Los Angeles on Friday all the skills he has refined in nearly ten years of title fights and a life in the gym will be used to counter Lomachenko’s gifts. Crolla won his world title in 2015, a body shot finished the fight. He retained it with another body shot and then lost to Linares.

The bookies might be right, Arum might be right and a massacre best viewed through your fingers might unfold, but not before Crolla makes Lomachenko think. There will be a fight at the Staples Centre in downtown Los Angeles and Crolla will be part of it and a better part than 1-100 suggests.