BOXING

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 74, Issue 146, 23 June 1931, Page 4

BOXING

STRIBLING FAVOURITE EXPERIENCE AND FORM. MAX SCHMELING’S CHANCES. Ou experience and form Young Stribling should be a favourite over Alax Schmeling when they meet on July 3, writes Walter Trumbull, a New York sport critic. He supposedly has a better left hand, more speed, more boxing skill, and a bettor knowledge of the game. And Sharkey once said that to walk into Stribling’s right hand punch was to invite him to knock your head off. Yet I find a surprising number of fight followers of long standing and calm judgment who are of the opinion that Schmeling will win the Cleveland bout. They are so firmly of that opinion that they are going to bet on it. They figure that Alax will be on the short end and, at any favourable odds, a good bet. Some of them figure him a bet at any price. I asked one veteran why he was so sure Schmeling would win. I knew it was not because he was a Schmeling booster, for he isn’t. I don’t think he cares a lot about the young German as an individual. But he is a man who never bets on sentiment. He told me that he thought Schmeling is generally under-estimated as a lighter; that he is tough and smart. He said that Alax fought beautifully against Alonte, but at that time he was not sure how well Alonte could take it. But, punch and not any fragility on the part of an opponent. This veteran light follower thinks Schmeling has the best short, straight right-hand punch that there is in tho game, and that it is a better right blow than .Tack Dompsev’s. Sooner or later in a. light this export, believes Max will land that right, and if ho hits Stribling squarely the Georgia battler will either go down or fold up. Schmol ling, this veteran insists, will outgamc Stribling and outpunch him. Afaybe, but it seems a lot to ask of a man who has been out of the ring lor a year to boat a fighter of Stribling’s experience ami ability. I still think that Stribling has every physical quality which goes to make a ehnmpion. This probably will be his final chance to show that ho has tho spark without which physical qualities are only so much waster matter. If Stribling loses this bout ho can have no alibi.