Boxing: Tua gets rough with 'giant'

By PETER JESSUP

It is just four weeks from the biggest day in David Tua's life, and although he has stepped up sparring work and is in demand by all major newspapers and television stations in Las Vegas, he remains relaxed, unlike everyone else in camp.

He faced heavy-duty action from giant Ghanaian Lee Alhassan yesterday, the pair going hammer and tongs towards the end of their session.

The muscled monster Alhassan was chosen because he is the size of Lennox Lewis.

Tua's trainer, Ronnie Shields, is working him into the mind-set he needs to go in and through Lewis' longer reach and right jab.

Everyone, including Tua, knows he is going to get hit in doing that. It is the work he does once he gets inside Lewis' reach that will count.

Yesterday, he was going lower, driving in towards Alhassan, then up, working body punches and his left and right uppercut. The famed left hook crashed into Alhassan several times.

While the Ghanaian threw plenty, most of his better blows were slipped as Tua advanced relentlessly.

"Make him punch, make him punch," Shields kept calling from Tua's corner. "Stay down, stay down."

The observers believe one of Lewis' weak points is taking body shots, and undoubtedly Tua will try to land big punches to his abdomen to try to unsettle the bigger fighter, as he has done with Robert Daniels and Obed Sullivan in his last two fights.

Veteran boxing broadcaster Bob Sheridan, with 656 world titles under his belt, rated the session very heavy, especially the last round.

The referee for the bout will be determined by the Nevada State Athletic Commission two days before the fight at the Mandalay Bay casino on November 12 (NZ time).

Sheridan rates Joe Cortez the world's best and is hoping he gets the nod. It needs to be someone experienced enough to step in and haul Lewis off Tua because he is bound to try and hold, to push Tua's head down, to get his glove around Tua's neck and try to hold his head to line up for the big punch, which is what Lewis did to finish Michael Grant in his last fight.

Tua does not lose anything in the later rounds, Sheridan said, but Lewis will.

Tua, with 37 wins and only the one points loss to Nigerian Ike Ibeabuchi, has more knockouts - 32 - than any boxer Lewis has faced. Lewis' record is 37 wins, with 29 by knockout, one loss to Oliver McCall, in 1994, and the draw with Evander Holyfield.

Shields was clearly more nervous than anyone at the camp yesterday, with this fight likely to define his career as a world-class trainer. "You ready, you ready?" he asked Tua repeatedly. Tua just nodded.

"You don't look nervous at all, Dave. Are you?" Shields asked.

Tua replied: "Nerves? Yeah, you need some of those to keep the edge. But frightened? Nah, man."

Before sparring he was re-listening to his telephone messages. His son, Kaynan, calls every day, with the machine left to hold as many of his messages as its software allows.