By William Mackay: Boy, when it rains it pours for WBC super middleweight champion Carl Froch (24-0, 19 KOs). Just last week, Froch learned that the British television networks decided not to show his April 25th title defense against former WBC/WBO middleweight champion Jermain Taylor (28-2-1, 17 KOs), but now Joe Calzaghe has come down on the side of Taylor and is predicting that Jermain will win if both fighters are “at their best.”
That’s got to hurt Froch, who has wanted to get a fight with Calzaghe for quite some time.
One has to wonder whether Calzaghe was saying this just so that he could strike another dagger into the heart of Froch just when he’s at his weakest point due to the television blackout. Froch has been less than happy with Calzaghe the past two months after Calzaghe retired without giving him a shot at beating him.
This hasn’t been lost on Calzaghe, who has wondered why Froch keeps talking about him now that he’s retired from boxing. Calzaghe feels that Froch should try to go out and make a name for himself on his own rather than trying to rely on getting a fight with him in order to try and make a quick name.
I doubt that Calzaghe would pick Taylor just to get back at Froch, because he’s never been one to get into tit for tat type games with fellow boxers in the past.
Calzaghe feels that Froch’s win over Jean Pascal perhaps wasn’t as important as it seems on the surface, because Calzaghe isn’t entirely sure that Pascal is truly a world class fighter, says Calzaghe in the South Wales Argus.
The victory over Pascal, a narrow 12-round decision in December 2008, was the biggest win of Froch’s career by far and the one that put his name on the map for many American’s and Canadian fans. Calzaghe, though, doesn’t see the win as all that special and isn’t ready to crown Froch just yet after that performance.
Besides Froch, Calzaghe also isn’t impressed with Taylor and wonders about whether he has the heart to beat a fighter like Froch. Joe gives Froch credit in that department, saying that Froch has a lot of heart and a good chin.
Froch, 31, doesn’t have the speed or the athleticism that Taylor has, but Carl is hoping that he can wear Taylor down and hurt him with his big shots as the fight moves forward into the fight.
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