Namibian ‘Man About Boxing’ Nestor Tobias docked in the UK last Sunday brimming with belief that his charge Paulus Moses can reclaim a portion of the world lightweight pie when he goes up against WBO monarch Ricky Burns at the Braehead Arena on Saturday.
Once a decent pro middleweight who locked horns with the likes of Giovanni Pretorius, Adrian Dodson and Rudy Markussen during an 18 fight career in the 1990s, the man they call ‘Sunshine’ has trained, managed and occasionally promoted Moses since ‘The Hitman’s’ formative amateur days at the Nestor Sunshine Boxing and Fitness Academy back home in Katutura.
On Monday evening he spoke with boxing writer Glynn Evans about his man’s past, preparation and prospects.
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Nestor, you’ve been involved with challenger Paulus Moses since the beginning of his amateur career in 2000. What are Paulus’s qualities, firstly as a fighter, but also as a person?
Paulus’s best weapons are his jab and his speed plus his power in both punches (fists). While he is very aggressive in the ring, outside he is a very humble, hard working and disciplined family man.
Through his profession as a police officer, he knows the law and order of life and he respects everybody. He is a very good guy. Socially, he likes to listen to music and he loves expensive cars. He’s just bought a top of the range BM(W) to celebrate getting another world title fight so quickly.
Back home in Namibia, he is a huge superstar. Wherever he goes, into the schools, the small towns, the farms, the streets, everybody knows and loves him. Whenever he fights in Namibia he always sells out. Everybody back home wants to watch this fight and we are still hoping that a deal can be agreed for it to be televised live on the Namibian national channel. The country would come to a stand still.
Moses has fought overseas several times before, notably stopping Andriy Kudryavtsev in nine over in the Ukraine and capturing the WBA lightweight crown in Japan against Yusuki Kobari. How will he cope with the passionate sold-out Braehead crowd on Saturday night?
Paulus will enjoy the Scottish crowd very much. When he stopped Kudryavtsev in the Ukraine, there were over 10,000 in an open space but it did not disturb him. When they all cheer, they are not feeling the punch, only the opponent!
Anyway, Paulus always believes the cheering is for both fighters and that it just shows that the crowd are really enjoying his fight. Japan was also very noisy but that just boosted Paulus’s performance. Even after he won the title from their champion, Kobari, the Japanese crowd all fell in love with him.
When Paulus surrendered his title, by sixth round knockout loss to Venezuela’s Miguel Acosta in Windhoek, Namibia in May 2010, it was the only loss of his 78 fight boxing life (amateur and pro). That was a major upset at the time. What went wrong?
All I can say is that Paulus had personal problems that night and was not himself inside the ring. His mind was not on the fight. The defeat stands as part of his record but for me, he remains undefeated. Acosta didn’t beat the real Paulus Moses. If people read anything into that fight then they are making a big mistake.
How has your preparation gone?
Perfectly. We had already begun training for a fight scheduled for March20th when, on 12th January I think it was, we received a call from (matchmaker) Dean Powell offering the world title fight against Ricky Burns.
Paulus has been training in my gym back in Namibia and the training is very, very tough. We do our outwork in the morning, a 10 kilometre run plus our strength and conditioning, then in the afternoon we do two hours at the boxing gym. It’s extremely hot in the gym and we have good sparring partners. We’ll be ready.
What do you know of Ricky Burns and why are you so confident that you can come to Scotland and take his title?
I’ve watched Ricky’s fights with Roman Martinez, the Ghanaian (Joseph Laryea) and Michael Katsidis. He works very hard, is very busy but I’ve seen nothing that I’ll not sleep well over. Paulus has more speed and is more mature in his boxing ability. Clearly he also has more punching power. It will be a good fight and we have trained for distance (12 rounds). Points or knockout, we will come out on top.
What are Paulus’s remaining ambitions in the sport? If he loses, given that he’s 33, could this be his last fight?
There is no talk of losing! He wants to make history by becoming the first Namibian to win world titles with two separate organisations, the WBO and the WBA. After we have defeated Ricky Burns everything will take care of itself, our promoter Don King will see to that. Paulus aims to become a ‘Super’ champion and unify all the titles before he retires.
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