Oleksandr Usyk says Derek Chisora can’t hit what he can’t see

Former undisputed cruiserweight champion Oleksandr Usyk will be making his second heavyweight outing against the rugged Derek Chisora once all the logistics get sorted out. But while Chisora, who’s known for his hard charging style, will be looking to impose his size and strength on the smaller Usyk, Usyk tells Sky Sports that Chisora will have to track him down before he can detonate anything of consequence.

“Normally I face this kind of plan, every fight. If you want to hit the target, you need to see the target, because he can throw as much punches as you can, but you need to land them into the target.”

Chisora, for his part, comes in fully aware that Usyk is going to try to use his superior boxing craft to win the fight. Chisora just doesn’t want to allow it to become that kind of fight.

“I’m going to focus on what I do. I’m going to focus by going in the ring, and start looking for my man, and that’s it. He’s going to dance around, but we’ve got certain things we’ve been practising on and things we’ve been doing every day. It will pay off.”

Now at age 36 and considering the number of battles he’s already been through, Chisora certainly isn’t in his physical prime. But despite that, he has a real mean streak inside the ring and is known to bring the action no matter what. Sometimes that works in his favor, and sometimes it doesn’t.

Against Usyk, who is naturally smaller than Chisora, perhaps his pressure style and physicality could cause some real problems. But again, it’ll be a matter of whether or not he can effectively close the distance on Usyk to land those blows in the first place.