Anthony Mundine says he will beat Jeff Horn and then retire from boxing

AFTER 18 years as the biggest drawcard in Australian boxing, Anthony Mundine announced that he plans to retire from the sport after knocking out Jeff Horn at Suncorp Stadium.

Anthony Mundine says he plans to leave boxing on a high by beating Jeff Horn. Pic Annette Dew

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AFTER 18 years as the biggest drawcard in Australian boxing, Anthony Mundine announced that he plans to retire from the sport after knocking out Jeff Horn at Suncorp Stadium on November 30.

The man who has made $30 million since walking away from a lucrative NRL career as the Dragons’ playmaker in 2000, says he will go out with a “a massive bang’’ against Horn.

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“I’m super confident that I can beat Jeff Horn and I believe that I can even stop him inside the distance,’’ Mundine said last night after training in the stifling heat at the Logan Boxing Club south of Brisbane.

“What better way to leave boxing than to beat the guy who beat Manny Pacquiao before 50,000 people in a huge football stadium?”

Mundine said at 43 he could still fight at the top level for another five years but no longer had the desire to keep doing it because the training was so tough.

“I’ve had a great career, shocked a lot of people and won world titles when no one thought it was possible,’’ he said. ``I earned $30 million from the sport and with no amateur background became a world champion and beat a lot of big name fighters along the way.

Anthony Mundine says he plans to leave boxing on a high by beating Jeff Horn. Pic Annette Dew

“I want to beat Horn so I can leave the sport on a huge high.’’

Mundine says his career highlight was winning the WBA super-middleweight (76kg) title against big-hitting American Antwun Echols in Sydney in 2003 but he says stopping Horn inside the distance will be the exclamation point on a great career.

Mundine and Horn will come face to face tomorrow afternoon (Wednesday) at a press conference at Suncorp Stadium.

The pair sparred five years ago and while Horn, who had recently fought at the 2012 Olympics, says he got the better of “The Man”, Mundine has a different story.

“Horn landed some good shots and so did I,’’ Mundine said. “But what Jeff doesn’t tell people was that I had already done eight hard rounds of sparring in the Brisbane summer heat and humidity before he got in the ring. It was about even between us but if I had been fresh I know it would have been a much different story.’’

Jeff Horn will fight Anthony Mundine on November 30 at Suncorp Stadium.

Mundine said he expected his fight with Horn to be an ``enormous hit’’ and was confident that the crowd would top the 30,000 who saw each of his battles with Danny Green.

“It’s going to be an enormous night and I want people to see a really entertaining battle with a great undercard supporting it,’’ Mundine said.

“I want to win big on the biggest night ever in Australian boxing.

“I’m not going to belittle Jeff but there’s nothing he can do in any area that can top what I can do. I have it all over him in speed and experience. At 71kg I might not have the power that I had in the heavier weight divisions but I will still have the punch to hurt him.

“If he’s hoping my age will be a factor then he’s in for a shock.

“Jeff is a good fighter but he’s very unorthodox and his feet are all over the place. Sometimes it looks like he’s fighting on crack because his feet are everywhere. That doesn’t mean he isn’t effective because even Muhammad Ali did a lot of unorthodox things and they worked for him.

“But I know exactly what Horn’s got and I have the answer to everything he does.’’

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