DEVON ALEXANDER vs ANDRIY KOTELNIK

The junior welter division is star-studded, with Timothy Bradley, Devon Alexander and Marcos Maidana all holding championship belts while Juan Manuel Marquez has said he seeks a title at 140 pounds and Victor Ortiz is waiting in the wings.
 
Most people in the business believe that Bradley and Alexander are the best of this talented bunch. Bradley won comfortably but not in very exciting fashion when testing the welterweight waters on HBO a couple of weeks ago. On Saturday, it’s Alexander’s turn to show what he can do when he defends his title at home in St. Louis against the seasoned and durable former champ Andreas Kotelnik on HBO’s Boxing After Dark.
 
The light-heavyweight title fight on this show between Tavoris Cloud and Glen Johnson is the one that has the greatest intrigue for serious fight fans, but Alexander is the local fighter and he will no doubt create the biggest buzz among the on-site spectators in the Gateway City.
 
Alexander, 23, is undefeated and he is entertaining to watch, a southpaw with a fast-punching, aggressive style. He has seemed to be improving almost fight by fight, looking stronger and punching harder. In his last fight, Alexander caught Juan Urango with a beautifully timed right uppercut from his southpaw stance to drop the strong and dangerous Colombian in the eighth round of what had been a compelling fight for the first seven rounds, then floored him again with a follow-up barrage to score his most important victory. Before this, Alexander stopped former champ Junior Witter in eight one-sided rounds when he simply overwhelmed the veteran with pressure and busy punching.
 
Although Alexander is strongly fancied to win on Saturday it would be a significant achievement if he could become the first to stop the Ukrainian veteran.
 
Kotelnik is very experienced, an Olympic silver medallist who has been the 12-round distance 10 times, while he stopped Gavin Rees in the 12^th to become champion. He is durable and keeps a tight defence. Kotelnik weathered the biggest attacks that Marcos Maidana could throw at him and edged out a narrow win over the heavy-handed Argentinean.
 
When Kotelnik lost on points to Amir Khan he was never in any trouble although the Ukrainian boxer was clearly frustrated by the British boxer’s speed and movement. If Kotelnik could hardly win a round against Khan it is difficult to see what he can do against Alexander, a fast and classy young fighter who is poised to make a strong impression in front of his home crowd and in his second consecutive appearance on HBO.
 
The addition to the Kotelnik team of veteran trainer Stacy McKinley might help, if only because the fighter might benefit from some fresh thinking — but I don’t think it will help enough.
 
Kotelnik, 32, is a solid technician but lacks star quality and he is not an especially hard puncher. Alexander’s busy combinations should keep Kotelnik bottled up defensively for much of the fight. I can see Kotelnik landing some right hands through the middle but not enough to get into the fight to any great extent. This looks like being Alexander’s fight all the way.
 
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