James Tennyson – “I’m not going to go out there and try blast him out”
James Tennyson [17(13)-2(2)] has the gameplan that he believes will lead him to victory over Declan Geraghty next weekend.
The pair will trade blows for the Irish super featherweight title on Saturday February 18th at the Waterfront Hall in Belfast, live on Boxnation.
The fight has perhaps been packaged as a classic boxer versus puncher affair, but Tennyson assures that it wont be as straightforward as that and that he wont be overly aggressive against slick southpaw Geraghty [14(4)-1(0)].
The Assassin outlined how “I’m going to go out and box a bit. It’s ten rounds, it’s a ten round fight, so I’m not going to go out there and try blast him out.”
“I’m going to go in and box, use my boxing ability, and if it goes to war it goes to war. I think both of us are going to be ready, both men know what’s coming, that it’s going to be a tough night.”
“Everything’s going well. I had a good Christmas, I kept training, I was in the gym Christmas morning ticking over. I’m sparring away, I’m getting a lot of good sparring with Fitzy [Joe Fitzpatrick] who has a similar style [to Geraghty]. It’s going good, so I’m looking forward to it.”
“We’ll just take it as it comes. Me and Tony [Dunlop, trainer] have been going over our gameplans. Tony’s watched a lot of him, even in the amateurs, and he knows his style so we’re bringing in sparring partners to match it and we’ve got a gameplan set and we’re just going to stick to them and, if all goes well on the night, we’ll get the decision,”
“I know what kind of fight it’s going to be and I know how good it’s going to be for the crowd. I’m looking forward to it.”
The clash had been due to take place on December 3rd in Glasgow, only to be postponed due to a cut sustained by Tennyson a month beforehand, something the Poleglass man feels was a blessing in disguised. He explained that “I think, in a way, it was probably better because the fight was meant to be in Scotland which made no sense for an Irish title. The fight is the talk of the place at the minute so I think it was a godsend that it [the cut] happened.”
“It could have been the top of the bill itself. I don’t understand why they wanted it in Scotland, it’s an all-Ireland fight between Belfast and Dublin.”
It’s an important fight for Tennyson less than a year after his British featherweight title loss to Ryan Walsh last April, a defeat which saw him subsequently move up to the more comfortable weight of 130lbs. The Belfast man feels that it is the perfect platform to jump back into the top level of the domestic scene. He explained that “it’s a huge fight. Coming off that loss [to Walsh] it was a bit of a dampner, but if I get a win here it’s going to bring me back up.”
“Even going into super featherweight I’m still up there in the top ten of the [British] rankings. I feel a lot better, my weight’s actually pretty low at the minute to be honest. I’m feeling 100%, I’m getting hard rounds in sparring, I’m feeling strong, I’m feeling good.”
“The titles are going to start coming again, and I’m still young, I’m 23, I’ve a lot of time on my hands. Taking a defeat is not going to set me back because of the time I’ve got, but I’m going out to win and I haven’t even got a loss in my mind whatsoever.”
Photo Credit: Ricardo Guglielminotti – The Fighting Irish (@ThefIrish)
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