SAVON CRUISES HOME TO GOLDEN TREBLE
Cuba's Felix Savon punishes Russia's Sultanahmed Ibzagimov in the 91kg boxing final. Peter Mueller/Reuters
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AN OPEN wound showed like a tiny mouth beneath Felix Savon's left eye but it scarcely inconvenienced the remarkable Cuban in Sydney yesterday as he used yet another Olympic boxing final as a declaration of the superiority he has been ramming home to the rest of the world's amateur heavyweights since the middle of the 1980s. He is 33 and his power to
dictate and intimidate is noticeably shrinking but his points
victory over a game Russian rival for the gold medal was comfortable enough to remind him that his real challenger these days is history.
Nobody in the boxing hall at Darling Harbour had seriously doubted his capacity to beat Sultanahmed Ibzagimov, a 25-year-old army sports instructor from Rostov-on-Don. The persistent questions were about how he compared with Teofilo Stevenson, the other glorious big man of Cuban boxing, whose record of three golds at successive Olympics Savon equalled with yesterday's quiet triumph. Statistically, the current champion might easily have had the edge by now, since his nation's
politically-based boycott of the Seoul Games probably prevented him from starting his sequence in 1988.
But in my view such niceties are swamped by the overwhelming case for regarding Stevenson as much the more devastating fighter. The timing of his right hand was so uncannily sweet that it made him simply the most phenomenal puncher I have ever seen, amateur or
professional.
Judging Savon by his Sydney form is blatantly unfair. He is considerably less aggressive than he was in his prime, when his right was frequently a pulverising weapon.
Against Ibzagimov, he preferred to rely rather conservatively on the vast advantages in athletic scope provided by his 6ft 6in, long-armed physique. His proportions are almost freakish in a weight class limited to 91kg, or 2011b, and his 6ft opponent was obliged to try to reach his head with calculated lunges. Ibzagimov had occasional success, although he could not claim credit for inflicting the cut high on Savon's left cheek. That was a legacy of a semi-final battle with a
German, and when it reopened in the final it merely encouraged the veteran to be increasingly cautious on the way to a 21-13 win.
Savon was one of four Cuban finalists in the tournament. All of them fought yesterday and all of them won gold. Like Savon, the other three - Guillermo Rigondeaux Ortiz (54kg), Mario Kindelan (60kg) and Jorge Gutierrez (75kg) - beat men from countries that were included in the former USSR, which was not surprising. Such nations have sent an amazing volume of effective performers to these Games. No fewer than 58 of them made it to the quarter-final stage and 12 of them survived
into the finals, five from Russia, four from Kazakhstan, two from Ukraine and one from Uzbekistan.
The achievement looked rather less impressive after the Cubans got to work yesterday and by the end of the session the only gold medallist who would previously have represented the USSR was Oleg Saitov, who repeated the success he enjoyed in the 67kg, welterweight, category in Atlanta four years ago.
However, it is still a sobering thought that so many contenders could be supplied from what used to be a single country entitled to enter just 12 boxers in the competition.
Realism persuaded Britain to send only two fighters to Sydney and the fact that one of them, the 28-year-old Londoner Audley Harrison, qualified for the final of the super-heavyweight (above 91kg) class makes the selectors look like smart betting men. Harrison's performance in his semi-final gave him the right to national acclaim, regardless of anything that happened against Mukhtarkhan Dildabekov of Kazakhstan in the final today.
His opponent in the semi was a ponderous Italian southpaw, Paolo Vidoz, a man ill-equipped to present a fierce examination of Harrison's swifter, more fluent skills, but the authoritative disposal of his challenge was sufficiently impressive to suggest that the Briton could go all the way to glory. The loser was bloodied and subdued by the end of the fourth round, with a points reckoning of 32-16 showing against him.
During the battle Harrison, who has sometimes been suspected of taking his talents too lightly, of not driving himself enough, was cleverly exhorted in his corner. "He's going to panic now and he is going to come like a tank," he was told. "It's the only chance he can have. Don't let him get set. Get in your shots and then move!"
The Londoner responded so well that his flurries brought points to him in an avalanche. Money could now be arriving with a similar rush.
HUGH MCILVANNEY
Sunday Times
