Carl Froch 167.5 – Andre Ward 168 lbs
Kell Brook 148 – Luis Galarza 147.5
Bowie Tupou 242 – Donnell Holmes 226
Edison Miranda 175 – Kariz Kariuki 174.5
Yordanis Despaigne 174.5 – Cornelius White 173
Boyd Melson 155 – Danny Lugo 152.5
John Lennox 224.5 – Jeramiah Witherspoon TBA
Venue: Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City, New Jersey
Televised by SHOWTIME
By William Mackay: The Super Six tournament will finally reach its climax on Saturday night in a battle between WBC super middleweight champion Carl Froch and WBA champ Andre Ward. Froch struggled in his first two fights of the tournament, winning a questionable 12 round decision against Andre Dirrell while fighting at home in Nottingham, England, and then losing a 12 round decision to Mikkel Kessler in his second fight.
Froch turned things around in his last two fights against Arthur Abraham and Glen Johnson. Froch easily won the Abraham fight by a 12 round decision, but had problems against Johnson in beating him by a 12 round majority decision.
In Ward’s first fight of the tournament, he dominated Mikkel Kessler, the fighter favored to win the Super Six tourney going in. Ward made it look easy. However, some of Kessler’s fans, including Froch, believe that Ward beat Kessler because of a problem with the two fighters clashing heads frequently.
Kessler ended up badly cut in the fight and his fans felt that he would have won had the cuts not happened. Ward was dominating the fight well before Kessler was cut, however. It seems more likely that some people have a hard time accepting that Kessler was out of his league against Ward and he simply didn’t have enough talent to compete.
In Ward’s next fight, he battered a weight drained and overmatched Allan Green in winning a lopsided 12 round decision in June 2010. Ward took a different tactic in this fight, choosing to battle on the inside the entire 12 rounds rather than picking Green apart on the outside like Ward had done with the slower Kessler.
In Ward’s last fight, he dominated a desperate Arthur Abraham in beating him by a convincing 12 round decision. Abraham came into the fight having lost his last two Super Six tournament fights to Andre Dirrell by disqualification and to Froch by a one-sided 12 round decision. Abraham fought well in the first couple of rounds, but was then outclassed by the quicker Ward the test of the way.
As for Saturday’s fight, it’s going to come down to whether or not Froch can control Ward on the inside and if he can make him pay for his lunging attacks. Ward will either fight Froch on the outside like he did Kessler or battle him in close. Ward has got two options and will likely succeed with either one he chooses. Like a lot of European fighters, Froch doesn’t fight well on the inside and is kind of out of his element when the action gets in close. On the outside, Ward is still the much quicker fighter compared to Froch and will likely dominate there as well.