Boxing News: In their super-featherweight unification match, Alycia Baumgardner is aiming to steal the show on Saturday’s historic night of women’s boxing by stopping “basic” Mikaela Mayer.
Prior to Claressa Shields and Savannah Marshall’s grudge match for the undisputed middleweight belt following a decade-long rivalry, the American pair compete in the penultimate fight at The O2.
The WBC and IBO championships are currently in Baumgardner’s possession after she defeated Terri Harper in Sheffield in November through fourth-round TKO.
Since then, she has successfully defended her titles, defeating Edith Soledad Matthysse by unanimous decision in April. She expects a similar result against Mayer.
“The only thing Mikaela brings is what she always brings, which is an amateur style fighter,” Baumgardner told Sky Sports. “She’s a one-dimensional fighter, she looks the same as she did in the amateurs as she does in the pros.
“There are levels to this game and I believe she’s only maybe up a notch in her career, I don’t see anything that stands out to me. I’m not looking up Mikaela Mayer’s fights, she’s not that impressive to me.
“Credit to her for what she’s done but she’s not at my level, I just believe she’s a one-dimensional fighter. She’s basic, as they say.”
The two competitors have engaged in back-and-forth verbal sparring over the course of the past year as their rivalry has heated up. Mayer has criticised Baumgardner’s performance in her lone career loss to Christina Linardatou in 2018 and has called the 28-year-old “immature and angry” during the build-up.
“As for her comments, Mikaela has to speak herself up at this point,” said Baumgardner. “She knows I’m a threat, she knows she’s in there with somebody she’s never been in there with before so her approach to the fight is to build the fight and make herself feel better and I get it.
“But it’s comical for me at this point, it’s funny to see the things she’s saying and she actually believes them so it is what it is.
“I’ve already been motivated with the fact I am fighting her and with her comments it just makes the fight even more exciting because it just shows that there is so much more for people to see.”
Additionally, Mayer had earlier made the implication that Baumgardner did not want the fight, a charge that the latter quickly refuted.
For boxing fight, boxing championship, boxing live score,
boxing tournament, boxing ring and other boxing news follow livematchupdatesnews.com.
