By Paul Willock: This fight is a difficult one to predict, not because I do not know who to pick for the win, but you never know how a fight with Hopkins will end up because he makes most of them look ugly. My long thought out prediction is that Bernard ‘The Executioner’ Hopkins (48-5, 32 KO’s) will be stopped for the first time in his career by a young, prime Kelly ‘The Ghost’ Pavlik (34-0, 30 KO’s).

For the first few rounds, Hopkins will make the fight look ugly, with his superior defensive abilities he will be able to slip away from the constant one twos that Pavlik will be firing at him. He’ll clinch, head butt and possibly milk a few body shots, claiming them to be low blows, which we’ve all seen before in the bout against a light hitter, Joe Calzaghe. But how long can Bernard hold this dirty fighting up? Pavlik is no doubt a heavy hitter, and with constant pressure coming from him too, this will soon break down Hopkins’ defence. Hopkins will begin to look slow, tired and a different fighter altogether. Bernard simply cannot take this kind of pressure at his age.

We’ve see that younger fighters haven’t been able to handle Pavlik’s heavy hitting pressure, so how could an old Hopkins possibly handle 12 rounds of it? His dirty defence will carry him through to the second half of the fight, but it won’t hold up all night. He’ll eventually be a fairly easy target, and Kelly will take the opportunity to knock him out with his fierce one twos. It will be an ugly first half, but the pressure will prove too much for the 43 year old and he will be beaten by another “white boy”.

However, there is a possibility that Pavlik’s career could take a fall. There are only a few days left until the fight, and I’m still seeing countless stories regarding a possible bout with Pavlik and Calzaghe. Could Pavlik be looking ahead too soon? Kelly and his trainer, Jack Loew, should be concentrating more on the fight on Saturday, because it’s only a few days away, and it I’m still seeing more articles about a possible future bout between Pavlik and Calzaghe than I am about the confirmed bout between Pavlik and Hopkins.

We’ve seen it many a time, fighters looking past their scheduled bout, thinking too far ahead against possible future opponents, and end up performing horribly in the ring because they can’t find their feet or concentrate properly. Take Junior Witter for example.

Once Ricky Hatton was knocked out by Floyd Mayweather Jr., all Witter could think about in the ring was a possible bout with Hatton, when he should of been thinking of the guy standing opposite him, Timothy Bradley…And look what happened, Witter looked awful throughout the fight and ended up losing his WBC light welterweight title, and more importantly, any chance of a bout with Hatton.

Has Pavlik set his targets too soon? Will his mind be more focused on Calzaghe during the fight? If he performs ugly against an ugly fighter, we may end up seeing Kelly Pavlik’s first career loss. We’ll soon see this coming Saturday.