Sat on his stool between the fifth and sixth rounds, Dec Spelman appeared to be reconsidering his life choices. He’d just endured a torrid spell of punches to his cheeks and ribs. His wide white eyes and reddening complexion showed little of the pain he was enduring. He must have felt sick when Anthony Yarde sprung to centre ring at the start of the sixth and began uncorking hooks and uppercuts. Sure enough, towards the end of the round Spelman went down. He rose again looking steady, but the referee waved the contest to a finish. A tad early, but mercifully.
This was Yarde’s second appearance since his failed bid for a light-heavyweight title. Thirteen months ago, with clear talent but inadequate experience, he travelled to Russia to face Sergey Kovalev in hopes the once-dreaded ‘Krusher’ was rusting out. The fight turned was a range war, with Kovalev’s straight-punching variety enough to chip at Yarde until he collapsed in the eleventh from a clean jab. The ending was a recreation of Nigel Benn’s loss to Michael Watson 31 years ago inside a circus tent in Finsbury Park.
For Yarde, the Kovalev fight was a risk. He challenged a heavy-handed, championship-hardened veteran with sound fundamentals, and in his own back-garden no less. It would have been a famous victory but it ended predictably. Against Spelman he was down at the level he should have been competing at before he jumped on the plane to Chelyabinsk. It showed early on with even exchanges filling the first three rounds. Yarde’s quality, his superiority, became apparent in the fourth when his variety expanded and his speed increased.
Yarde exhibits one of the better shoulder-rolls in boxing today. Standing side-on his right hand stays high against his cheek, his left arm crooked across the body. He squeezes his shoulders together, swivelling and bending at the waist. He presents very little target and remains primed to parry with his back hand and strike with venomous counterpunches. Boxing has been littered with poor approximations of the shoulder-roll in the post-Mayweather era, just as we’re beginning to see versions of the backhand dash from scores of Lomachenko wannabes. Those who adopt the former tend to leave their chins up in the air or don’t move enough at the waist. To execute the technique takes a blend of speed, anticipation, reflexes, and a honed sense of distance. Yarde has all of these plus an acute instinct of when to counterpunch, which he does with audible power.
At 29 years old and with very little accumulated damage taken during his career Yarde should continue to develop over the coming years. Against Kovalev he became one-dimensional surprisingly quickly, leaning to his right and hopping out of range time and again. No doubt Kovalev’s thudding taps interrupted and eventually halted the flow Yarde found against Spelman. However, once Yarde achieves that state he is very difficult to beat no matter who stands across the ring from him.
British champion Shakan Pitters, Olympian Joshua Buatsi, and former world title challenger Callum Johnson all sit in Yarde’s weight-class, all of whom are British. They would all provide excellent entertainment if matched with Yarde. Regardless, promotional and network politicking will be obstructive to any of those fights being made. More likely, after his already confirmed bout with Lyndon Arthur for the Commonwealth title, Yarde will again attempt to strive beyond British honours and earn another shot at one of the world titles. The best on the planet at 175 pounds are Dmitry Bivol and Artur Beterbiev. Both would dismantle Yarde in his current form. They may always be too far ahead of him, coming as they do from solid amateur schooling and having developed into hard-hitting, wily professionals much like Kovalev. Beterbiev in particular seems to have the kind of power that needs only to glance against a forehead to render the brain useless. If Yarde ends up in the ring with him any time soon, I wish him good luck and good night.
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