Predicting the Super Six stage 2 winners – Dirrell, Kessler and Ward and losers – Abraham, Froch and Green

By Scott Gilfoid: Next month, the second stage of the Super Six competition gets underway with the talented American Andre Dirrell facing Arthur Abraham in California for what could end being the most exciting match up of the tourney. Other fights in the stage two part of the tournament will have new World Boxing Association super middleweight champion Andre Ward facing Allan Green, the replacement for Jermain Taylor, who pulled of the tourney recently after suffering a bad knockout loss to Abraham on October 17th last year.

Rounding out the stage 2 competition will be a match between bitter rivals WBC super middleweight champion Carl Froch vs. former WBA champion Mikkel Kessler. Picking the winners and the losers of the second stage part of the Super Six tournament was rather easy after carefully examining the performances of the participants in the stage 1 part of the tournament and looking at their recent fights going into the tournament.

Below I’ve listed my predicted losers of the stage 2 part of the tourney:

Arthur Abraham – I think Abraham is very talented fighter with incredible punching power in each hand. He’s capable of ending a fight at a moment’s notice with a hard shot and a fighter has to be on their toes at all times when facing him. However, Abraham has the unfortunate luck of facing what I consider to be the best fighter in the Super Six tournament by far in 26-year-old Dirrell, who will be out for blood after losing a deeply controversial 12 round split decision to Froch in October last year. Dirrell will want to make up for that fight and will be looking to make an example of Abraham. Simply put, Dirrell is going to tear Abraham to pieces. This fight isn’t even going to be close. I think Abraham might finish on his feet, but his face is going to look like it’s been through a meat shredder from Dirrell’s powerful fists.

Carl Froch – Too slow, too clumsy and too stiff to beat Kessler. Froch has no chance of beating the Danish fighter. What’s worse for Froch is that he has to travel to Kessler’s neck of the woods and fight him in Herning, Denmark. I think Froch is going to be like superman being presented with a necklace of kryptonite when he steps foot in the MCH Messecenter Herning. Froch, without his screaming and cheering fans backing him up, will be lost. And Kessler is going to pound him at will, tearing the slow moving, near defenseless Froch apart with punch after punch. Froch doesn’t have much defense and Kessler’s going to have a field day battering him with punches. It will be like Froch has a ‘hit me’ me sign pasted on his face, because Kessler is going to be tattooing him with shots from the word go, and Froch won’t be able to do anything about it except take the shots. Froch also won’t help himself, naturally, by having his gloves down by his sides as he fights. I still can’t figure out why he does this, because he gets tagged every time. All I can think is that he watched a great fighter like Roy Jones Jr. and decided to copy his style. But it doesn’t work for Froch. You got to have hand speed to fight like that, and Froch is missing that ingredient.

Allan Green – I like Green’s hand speed. He’s perhaps the third fastest fighter in the tournament following Dirrell and Ward. Unfortunately, Green didn’t look at all good in his recent fight against Tarvis Simms, and Green looked absolutely horrible in his loss to Edison Miranda in 2007. I hate to say it but Green won’t be able to handle the hand speed and boxing ability of Andre Ward in their Super Six stage 2 match. I see Green coming out looking as timid as a kitten and winding up getting battered from one side of the ring to the other and ultimately knocked out by Ward.

The predicted winners of the stage 2 competition

Andre Dirrell Of the winners, Dirrell will very likely put on the best display of talent by beating Abraham by a lopsided decision. It will be easy for Dirrell, mainly because Abraham is so slow and predictable. Dirrell won’t have any problems landing his shots, and he’ll also be able to outwork Abraham because the German based fighter doesn’t throw a lot of punches. Picture Joshua Clottey, but with the high guard and all, but even a worse work rate them him.

Mikkel Kessler – Next to Dirrell and Ward, I see Kessler as the next best fighter in the tournament. He’s got it all – power, speed, defense and movement. He’s the whole ball of wax. Kessler would have breezed through the first round of the tournament had he faced Green or Froch, but he had the bad luck of getting matched against 2004 U.S. Olympic Gold Medalist Andre Ward. As soon as I saw that Kessler was matched up against Ward, I knew Kessler had no chance whatsoever. Ward was just too young and superior for Kessler to deal with. But Kessler’s luck is going to change for the positive in the stage 2 part of the competition, because his opponent Froch doesn’t have the same skill set as Kessler.

Andre Ward – Andre will have an easy time beating Green. I see this fight lasting only two or three rounds at best. Green won’t want to mix it up, but it won’t matter. Ward will come after him and brain him with a hard left to the head and the finish him off with a flurry as Green staggers around the ring like a drunk.

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