{"id":26295,"date":"2025-07-27T02:32:11","date_gmt":"2025-07-27T02:32:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/26295\/"},"modified":"2025-07-27T02:32:11","modified_gmt":"2025-07-27T02:32:11","slug":"trainer-joe-gallagher-says-his-heavyweight-lawrence-okolie-is-the-boogeyman-of-the-division","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/26295\/","title":{"rendered":"Trainer Joe Gallagher Says His Heavyweight Lawrence Okolie Is \u201cThe Boogeyman\u201d Of The Division"},"content":{"rendered":"<p data-start=\"82\" data-end=\"637\">Ace trainer Joe Gallagher is far from happy at the way his unbeaten heavyweight, former WBO cruiserweight champ and former WBC bridgerweight champ Lawrence Okolie, got next to no praise following his recent win over Keven Lerena. The fight took place on the undercard of Oleksandr Usyk\u2019s dominant rematch win over Daniel Dubois, and while \u201cThe Sauce\u201d didn\u2019t get the KO he had predicted and so badly wanted, Gallagher says the critics should realise that Okolie won every round and that he won the fight despite suffering a biceps injury during the action.<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"639\" data-end=\"861\">Okolie, now 2-0(1) as a heavyweight, is \u201cthe boogeyman\u201d of the division, Gallagher said when speaking with <a class=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/@RingMagazine\/\" target=\"_new\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" data-start=\"746\" data-end=\"796\">The Ring<\/a>, and people need to start talking about him as a threat to Usyk.<\/p>\n<p>Why is nobody saying Okolie\u2019s name?<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"903\" data-end=\"1545\">\u201cLawrence went in, never really got out of second gear with one arm and won every round,\u201d Gallagher said when speaking about Okolie\u2019s shutout win over the dangerous South African. \u201cThat\u2019s some performance. But the thing is, there\u2019s boxing people and there\u2019s people that don\u2019t know boxing and too many people are quick to jump at him whether he had a bad arm or not. That\u2019s still a good performance to shut him [Lerena] down. Everyone wants to keep talking about who\u2019s next? Joseph Parker, Moses Itauma, Derek Chisora. No-one wants to mention Lawrence Okolie, do they? Everyone says Martin Bakole is the boogeyman \u2013 no he\u2019s not \u2013 Lawrence is.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>What\u2019s next for \u2018The Sauce\u2019 once the biceps heals?<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"1602\" data-end=\"1937\">Londoner Okolie, highly ranked by the WBC, will now have to allow his biceps injury to heal, and as Gallagher said, a talked of fight between Okolie and WBC interim heavyweight champ Agit Kabayel will now have to \u201cgo on the back burner.\u201d But when he comes back, fully healthy, watch out the entire heavyweight division, Gallagher says.<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"1939\" data-end=\"2077\">\u201cPeople need to start putting Lawrence Okolie\u2019s name on the end of their tongues when they talk about the heavyweights,\u201d the trainer said.<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"2079\" data-end=\"2203\" data-is-last-node=\"\" data-is-only-node=\"\">Could Okolie be the man to surprise us all and become the first man to defeat the magnificent Usyk should this fight happen?<\/p>\n<p>&#13;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.boxing247.com\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Boxing News<\/a> | Trainer Joe Gallagher Says His Heavyweight Lawrence Okolie Is \u201cThe Boogeyman\u201d Of The Division<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ace trainer Joe Gallagher is far from happy at the way his unbeaten heavyweight, former WBO cruiserweight champ&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":26296,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[2560,16398,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-26295","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-boxing","8":"tag-boxing","9":"tag-queensberry-promotionsnleigh-dawneynboxingnundisputednheavyweightnchampionshipntitlenusykndubois","10":"tag-sports","11":"tag-uk","12":"tag-united-kingdom","13":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26295","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26295"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26295\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26296"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26295"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26295"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26295"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}