By Scott Gilfoid: IBF super middleweight champion Carl Froch is riding on a high right now from his wins over Lucian Bute and Yusaf Mack, and he now believes himself capable of beating Andre Ward and Mikkel Kessler. Not surprising, Ward isn’t on Froch’s immediate agenda for his next fight and he may not be in Froch’s plans for the entire 2013, although he says he is.
I have my doubts that he’ll fight until 2014. Froch wants Kessler next and he wants him the UK where Froch will have an advantage with a big crowd supporting him. Froch looked terrible last time he fought and lost to Kessler in 2010, but Froch’s wins over Bute and Mack have believing he can beat Kessler now.
Froch said to Sky Sports News “I strongly believe I will defend my title. He [Kessler] has just won the WBA title by beating Brian Magee so I will add another belt to my collection which will be fantastic.”
The only way I see Froch winning Kessler’s belt is if he wins the fight by a controversial decision because I don’t see Froch in the same class as Kessler. Froch have beaten a weight drained Mack and an underprepared Bute, but he’s not going to beat Kessler no matter where the fight is staged.
Froch is too slow, he doesn’t have a good jab, and he can’t handle Kessler’s combinations. Each time the two fighters flurried on each other in their fight in April 2010, Kessler got the better of Froch. It was that way for 12 rounds, and that’s why Froch lost the fight.
Like I said, I do think Froch can win in the UK, but only if it’s a controversial decision where he appears to lose but is still given the win by the judges. I saw one of those kinds of fights for Froch when he was given a highly questionable win over Andre Dirrell in Nottingham, England, and I thought Froch only won 3 rounds in that fight.
It was just an awful foul-plagued performance from Froch, and the referee didn’t lift a finger to penalize him for his various fouls. I realized early that it was going to be one of those Laissez-faire type fights when the referee failed to penalize Froch after he body slammed Dirrell in the 5th round. From there it got worse and it looked like pure chaos in the ring with rabbit punches, holding and hitting, you name it.
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