Copyright � 1998 Nando Media
Copyright � 1998 Reuters

ZAGREB (Sep 25, 1998 - 14:25 EDT) - In his native Zagreb nobody doubts that Zeljko Mavrovic will win a world heavyweight championship on Saturday.

Children at his former school and his old mentor believe Mavrovic's odds are far better than the outside chance given to him in the United States where he will fight 32-year-old Briton Lennox Lewis for the World Boxing Council (WBC) title.

When the two men meet at Mohegan Sun casino in Uncasville, Connecticut, at 5 a.m. on Sunday Zagreb time, an army of Croatian supporters will be glued to their television sets, knowing that for a small country like theirs such moments come rarely.

Croatian boxers, fighting under the flag of Yugoslavia until the country's break-up in 1991, held half a dozen Olympic medals and world amateur titles but their only big professional success was Mate Parlov's World Boxing Association (WBA) light-heavyweight title in 1978.

The 29-year-old Mavrovic's popularity hangs not only on his international success -- 27 victories in as many professional matches -- but also on his subdued demeanor and soft-spoken style contrasting sharply with his terrifying appearance and punk hairstyle.

"We'll watch the match no matter what," said two 12-year-old fans from the working-class suburb of Zagreb where Mavrovic was born and later earned his nickname "The Fist from Srednjaci."

The youngsters said boys in their school, attended by Mavrovic two decades ago, organized tournaments recreating his seven successful defenses of the European belt in which "there are few broken noses but a lot of tears."

At the nearby Mladost sports complex, spots of blood on the canvas of a small ring where Mavrovic trains were evidence of his sparring partners' pains, said Mirko Richter, the fighter's mentor and trainer who led him from his boxing beginnings 15 years ago.

Richter ascribed the 10-1 odds against his protege to a lack of knowledge and gave Mavrovic a good chance, saying his main strengths were intelligence, physical strength and psychological stability.

"If nothing unexpected happens in the first five rounds, I doubt Lewis will be able to resist the rhythm that Mavrovic will dictate," said the 60-year-old coach.

"He has shorter hands than Lewis and has to come close to him to be able to place a punch. That's risky and that's where Lewis's chance is," Richter said.

Lewis is taller and heavier -- he is expected to weigh in at 110 kg (242 pounds) on Saturday against Mavrovic's 100 kg (220 pounds) -- but the Croat, three years his junior, is faster.

Mavrovic's American coach Darkey Smith, in charge of putting the final touches to his 11 months of preparation said he believed his fighter would win.

"Lewis has got a big right hand, Zeljko can knock you out with the right hand but he can also knock you out with the left," Smith told local Radio 101 by telephone from Mavrovic's training camp in the United States.

Mavrovic has never been knocked down, let alone knocked out, in his 150-odd amateur and 27 professional fights, while Lewis suffered a knockout at the hands of Oliver McCall in 1994 in the only one of his 33 professional fights he has lost.

"I doubt Lewis will spoil his clean sheet," Richter said. "I taught all of my boys to fight so they can live normally after they have finished boxing and Mavrovic is great at escaping punches as well as blocking them."

Mavrovic was extremely aggressive as a junior when he was national champion at the age of 15 but Richter said he had taught him how to suppress the drive to rush forward and how to box in a more technically refined manner.

He draws much of his mental stability from a nine-year relationship with Jelena Balabanic, a popular astrologist, who says the stars look good for Mavrovic on Saturday.

By DAVOR HUIC, Reuters

Croatia's Mavrovic might give Lewis a scare from appearance alone

Copyright � 1998 Nando Media
Copyright � 1998 Reuters

UNCASVILLE, Conn. (Sep 24, 1998 - 20:19 EDT) - If life imitates art then someone should frisk Zeljko Mavrovic for a gun when he climbs into the ring against Lennox Lewis on Saturday.

Of course, some people say the little-known Croatian will need a gun to take the Briton's World Boxing Council heavyweight championship.

But even without a gun maybe Mavrovic can frighten Lewis to death.

The 28-year-old European heavyweight champion is such a dead ringer for Travis Bickle, the murderous anti-hero played by Robert DeNiro in the 1976 film, "Taxi Driver," that at least one observer here was looking for a chair to duck under when Mavrovic climbed onto the stage on Thursday for a news conference.

Mavrovic looks very much like DeNiro in the first place, but but with his head shaved except for a swath of brown hair down the centre in a "Mohawk" style, the resemblance is eerie. Couple his looks with his quiet, inscrutable demeanor and he's downright scary.

Mavrovic says he has seen "Taxi Driver" but did not model his hair style after the DeNiro character, although he said maybe he'd drive a taxi sometime, "just for fun."

Actually, his haircut was the result of a mistake committed by the fighter's companion, Jelena Balabanic. She said she was cutting Mavrovic' hair when she made some errant snips. He then asked her to shave him bald, but she convinced him to let her be creative and she produced the "do" that infringes on Travis Bickle's trademark.

"It looks good in the ring," Balabanic said, "because it brings out his dangerous appearance. It's become part of his personality. It's like good luck for him."

Mavrovic said of his haircut that "everybody on the street will recognize me, and if you are a champion you a have a right to have something special."

All associations with murderous psychotics aside, Mavrovic is not relying on luck or a fright-face to beat the 33-year-old Lewis in Saturday's fight, which will be broadcast over HBO's regular cable channel.

Mavrovic said he essentially has been training for this fight for 10 months and has closed all of his serious workouts to the public and to the press.

Mavrovic (27-0) said he will show Lewis a surprise in theopening seconds of the first round. "I have much more things to surprise Lennox Lewis than he has to surprise me."

About Lewis' weaknesses, "I think he is not enough fast for me," said Mavrovic, who speaks remarkably good English,considering he has been working on it for just two years.

Lewis (33-1) said his "goal is not to allow him tocapitalise on any mistakes I make. He's not a one-punch knockout artist, I am."

Maybe not, but Mavrovic is counting on the living the goodlife to help him.

The likable fighter from Zagreb, Croatia, is extremelyhealth conscious and gave reporters a virtual lecture on thedangers of drugs and the value of eating well and meditating to "improve your life."

The soft-spoken Mavrovic was sipping from a cup, which hesaid contained "chlorophyll from the green grass because itgives you lots of vitamins, but it is all natural."

He said for the most part he maintains a macrobiotic diet aspart of his "special way of life."

Mavrovic, who does not look particularly muscular, insisted by rattling off the weights he can lift in different exercises that he's much stronger than Lewis, whom he said he heard is lazy in the gym.

Asked his opinion of Lewis' courage, Mavrovic said, "I can see in his eyes before some of his fights he's an actor. He's what I call a very dangerous rabbit because if he's scared he can punch hard."

He dismissed any special advantage he has from the support of his entire country, saying "I'm proud that I'm Croatian ... but in the ring I am alone. I box for myself."

A poster for Saturday's fight proves that bad taste isnowhere near extinction in boxing.

Lewis camp long has tried to hype his fights innationalistic terms, pitting Britons against the country of his opponent.

Under Lewis' face on the poster is an English Spitfirefighter plane of World War II vintage protecting London's Tower Bridge from a strafing by Mavrovic' Messerschmitt, emblazoned with a Nazi Swastika.