Adam Azim turned what was supposed to be the toughest test of his career into his most well rounded, complete performance as a professional.
Last Saturday night, Azim bewildered and broke down former IBF junior welterweight champion, Sergey Lipinets, in nine rounds at London’s Wembley Arena. Sky Sports televised the fight.
Although Azim, 13-0 (10 KOs), was a very short price to win the fight, he still managed to make something of a statement by becoming the first man to stop the tough Kazakh at 140lbs. Brilliant IBF welterweight champion, Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis did get to Lipinets, 18-4-1 (13 KOs), in six rounds back in 2021 but that fight took place at 147lbs.
It is four years since Azim - who is still only 22 years old - burst on to the scene with a flurry of quick stoppages. The Slough teenager’s talent was immediately obvious and a series of domestic opponents were simply unable to live with his speed of hand and variety.
One of the most impressive parts of Azim’s development has been he way he has altered his style as he has progressed through the levels. He has listened to his trainer, Shane McGuigan, and now fights with much more patience.
Over the past two years he has accumulated 52 rounds of experience and has boxed ten rounds, three times. Azim hasn’t been dragged into deep waters yet, he has managed his way through the fights and still been able to find late finishes. He stopped Franck Petitjean in the tenth to win the European title, systematically took apart Ohara Davies in eight last October and now adds a controlled ninth round stoppage of former world champion, Lipinets, to his resume.
Last weekend provided the perfect example of his growing maturity. In the third round, a quick, counter left hook briefly dropped Lipinets.
Slightly hurt but compos mentis, he got to his feet and Azim spent the remaining 40 seconds of the round probing and testing Lipinets to see if he was ready to be taken out. Rather than expending energy trying to force a stoppage, he smartly realised that he had plenty more work to do. He came out for the fourth and got back down to the task hand.
“My performance was great,” he told Sky Sports in the ring after the fight. “I could have just dropped the pace a bit in the earlier rounds but Shane [McGuigan, his coach] said keep calm and I’m gonna catch him.
“The first knockdown, I didn’t even know I’d hit him. That was so quick. I had to be patient but in world class you have to be patient when you do your work but honestly, this is an emotional moment for my team, for my loved ones and all the family.”
Before the fight, Azim told The Ring that he has been spending a lot of time working on his inside and mid-range fighting. Those developments were clear for all to see.
As the rounds passed, Azim began to spend more and more time up close and personal with Lipinets. He cleverly bumped the 35 year-old around with his lead arm and shoulder, used upper body movement and subtle footwork to create angles and nullify Lipinets’ attacks and, eventually, established his right uppercut. The writing was on the wall for some time but Azim continued to work away steadily and kept punching until referee, Steve Gray, stepped in to save the brave Lipinets.
The major point of concern for Azim were the point deductions he collected for low blows. A number of left hooks strayed low and he lost points in both the fourth and seventh rounds. Wembley is in North London but the second shot in particular was so low it almost strayed south of the River Thames which divides the city.
There was no suggestion that Azim was deliberately going low - he had no need to - but, to be safe, he withdrew the left hook from his arsenal.
Azim will need all of his weapons once he begins to mix with the 140lb division’s elite operators but rather than being a technical issue, he put the mistakes down to a difficulty in adjusting to Lipinets size and revealed that a slight recalibration of his sights and the threat of some extra gym work from McGuigan cured the issue.
“He was going really low and i couldn’t see where his body belt was,” Azim said.
“We’ve got a guy in the gym who’s quite big and I was landing the body shots good with him, obviously he’s a bigger guy. Lipinets was really small and it was so hard for me to place the shots. That’s why i took the body shots out and started to throw the right hand to the body and the jab because it was landing better.
“He goes to me, ‘If you do that again, I’ll make you do 100 burpees in the gym.’”
Talk will now return to the possibility of a fight between Azim and Dalton Smith, 17-0 (!3 KOs), who collected the vacant European title with a one round demolition of France’s Walid Ouizza in Nottingham last week.
The fight seems unlikely to happen next but that won’t stem the unstoppable tide of questions either man has to answer about the other.
Azim was asked if the victory over Lipinets had helped to clear the path towards a fight with Smith. He kept his answer brief but looked directly down the camera and spoke directly to his Sheffield rival.
“It’s still marinating but when I do fight him, I’m gonna teach him a lesson. You better be watching.”