Video: Przemek Garczarczyk
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WBO cruiserweight champion Lawrence Okolie and challenger Michal Cieslak faced off at the final press conference ahead Sunday’s world title action at The O2 in London, shown live worldwide on DAZN.
Lawrence Okolie: “I’ve had 17 fights, 14 by KO, on the weekend it’ll be 18 and 15 by KO.”
Michal Cieslak: “I’m not interested on how hard he punches and how strong he is, I’m going to do what I have to on Sunday.”
Lawrence Okolie:
“I’ve had 17 fights, 14 by KO, on the weekend it’ll be 18 and 15 by KO. Everyone can say what they want about the opponent until after I’ve beaten them and then we’ll be onto the next one and we’ll see what everyone says about him.
“I think power is secondary, it’s more so for fans and my opponents to watch and see what I’m doing. In the ring, as I’m going to show on Sunday, there’s so many other things that I do that are overlooked. It all ends in a KO which is why people care about the power.
“Nothing else has mattered since the fight got signed, it’s up to be to wipe the smile off his [Cieslak] face and all of his Polish teammates on Sunday.
“It’s a must, 100% ends in a KO. 1 million percent.”
Shane McGuigan, trainer of Lawrence Okolie:
“Cieslak put on a fantastic performance against Makabu and I thought arguably could have won that fight. He’s only got the one blemish on his record, but these are the fights we need for Lawrence Okolie, he is the best Cruiserweight in the world, I know that for a fact – we just need to go out there a prove it.
“We’ve been doing a lot of work, he [Lawrence] joined me in early 2019. He’s always had power and has now learnt how to maintain the distance, be a bit more disciplined, keep range, but he’s still learning all the time. That’s the scary thing, when he moves up to Heavyweight, I believe he’ll be a two-weight World Champion. Massive hopes for Lawrence and I think it’ll be a showing of his true ability on Sunday.”
Michal Cieslak:
“To be honest, I don’t care what other people think like media or supporters, I’m focused on myself and on what I’m going to do Sunday.
“I am aware that there will be a lot of supporters from my city of Radom and other places around Poland, I can’t wait to fight in this bout.
“Today I’m focusing on myself so I’m not interested on how hard he punches and how strong he is, I’m going to do what I have to on Sunday and I’ll be celebrating then.”
Andrzej Liczik, trainer of Michal Cieslak:
“I can confirm that Cieslak is very well prepared for the fight on Sunday, he will go out there and defeat the opponent, Lawrence Okolie.
“I think that you will all find out on Sunday, we’ll confirm how we do it.”