Itauma: I need rounds to prove I’m the world’s best
Time may have ran out on Moses Itauma’s mission to become the youngest heavyweight champion since Mike Tyson blew away Trevor Berbick back in 1986 but, just 11 fights into his career, the 20-year-old is almost universally regarded as a man capable of carrying boxing’s glamour division into a new era once the names who have dominated the sport for so long have moved on, reports ringmagazine.com.
Two-time heavyweight champion, Tyson Fury, is now retired whilst fighters like current unified and Ring Magazine champion, Oleksandr Usyk, two-time champion, Anthony Joshua, and long reigning WBC title holder, Deontay Wilder, won’t be too far behind him.
Itauma gets his 2025 campaign underway against American southpaw, Mike Balogan, 21-1 (16 KOs), in Glasgow, Scotland on May 26.
On the outside, Itauma appears completely unfazed by the weight of expectation that has been heaped onto his shoulders.
“Personally, I don’t pay attention to it and I don’t really care but at the same time, I don’t like it because let’s say I’ve got an opponent and everyone expects me to knock him out and I don’t knock him out,” he said during an interview on talkBoxing.
“I feel it (the pressure) but I don’t care. I don’t care honestly only because it actually does me no favours. People’s expectations of me are not going to help me in the ring so I guess it’s kind of entertainment and I’ll go deliver.”
Itauma may prefer to keep things lowkey, but top class fighters – and elite heavyweights in particular – need an ego.
Itauma has yet to lose a fight either as an amateur or a professional and as impressive as he has been in front of the cameras, stories about his sparring exploits have been circulating since he was a schoolboy.
Itauma has only known success and success breeds confidence.
Ability-wise, the southpaw believes he is already within touching distance of the world’s best, but is wise enough to know he needs to to be fully prepared before actually stepping into the ring with them.
“My skill set – if you’re talking about my ring I.Q and what I display in the ring – I feel like I am the best in the world, but I haven’t displayed (that I can fight in) the later rounds that’s all that I kind of want to get ticked off,” he said.
“So my next opponent – or opponents this year – we’re just looking at fights to kind of get me into the later rounds because I feel like with Usyk, I feel that I’ve got a better skill set than him but I feel like towards the later rounds he’ll just outdo me because I’ve never been in that sort of fight. So, this year is just about giving me some rounds.”
