Bika wants Froch after Anthony Dirrell rematch

By Boxing News - 07/07/2014 - Comments

bikaBy Scott Gilfoid: Anthony Dirrell (26-0-1, 22 KO’s) and WBC super middleweight champion Sakio Bika (32-5-3, 21 KO’s) will do it again in a much needed rematch next month on August 16th at the StubHub Center in Carson, California. Dirrell, 29, was arguably robbed in their previous fight last December when the fight was scored a 12 round draw despite Dirrell’s much superior work, and cleaner landing shots.

The judges thought that Bika’s aggressiveness and higher punch output was more important than the higher connect percentage and the harder landing shots from Dirrell. Usually it’s the opposite with the judges scoring the fight for the harder puncher with the higher connect percentage, but not in this fight.

Bika thinks he’s going to beat Dirrell this time, and he says he wants to fight IBF/WBA super middleweight champion Carl Froch after that. I’m not sure that he’s going to have success with Dirrell, and I definitely can’t see Bika getting a fight against Froch, who appears to be heading into the shutdown mode of his career despite still being in his prime.

Bika was hoping to get one of the big names – Froch and Mikkel Kessler – to fight him, but when it became obvious that they weren’t going to do that, he then turned to Dirrell for a rematch. Half of 2014 is gone, and Bika has been out of the ring for the past 7 months. It’ll be 8 months by the time he faces Dirrell next month.

That’s obviously not how you want to do it when you’re a champion and not getting Floyd Mayweather Jr type money for your fights.
Bika said “I was at Wembley in May to watch Carl Froch knock out George Groves. I was impressed by the way Froch handled his unfinished business with George Groves and now I want to do the same with Dirrel. I felt I won the first fight with Dirrell and I’m happy my management team has been able to organize a rematch to show the world that I am the undisputed WBC champion.”

Dirrell fought an excellent fight in knocking Bika down, hitting him with hard counters all night, and showing good ring generalship. Bika did awful lot of fouling in the fight, and referee David Fields failed to step up and stop the constant fouling. I thought Bika should have lost at 5 points for the various fouls, but Fields chose not to insert himself into the fight by docking Bika points.

The key for Dirrell to beat Bika on August 16th is for him to stay on the outside, use his jab, and move in circles, because standing stationary in front of Bika like he did last time clearly isn’t going to work well unless Dirrell is able to throw more punches.

Dirrell is strictly a counter puncher, but he waited too much last time and showed too much restraint with his offense. If he can’t increase his work rate, then he’s going to need to circle the ring, jab and fight in an elusive manner like his older brother Andre Dirrell.

Anthony might want to study Andre’s gem of a fight against Carl Froch to learn how to beat Bika, because Andre put on a defensive clinic in dominating Froch in their 2009 fight. Froch fouled continuously from the 5th round on, but it would have been far worse for Dirrell if he hadn’t fought defensively and used movement to avoid the rabbit punches and other such roughhouse tactics from Froch in that fight.

Since Bika uses same physical style as Froch, Anthony is going to need to fight off of his back foot, jab, make Bika miss and attack him in 6-punch flurries all night long. If Dirrell can stay on the outside and charge in for at least 4-6 flurries in each round, he’ll win this fight easily, because Bika is too slow to handle Dirrell’s speed when he’s opening up with blinding 6-8 punch flurries.

Bika said “Dirrell was very lucky to get the draw. I was the busier fighter – throwing and landing the most punches – and I dropped him with a body shot which was counted as a low blow! I will be in the best shape of my professional career in August and will show boxing fans around the world that “The Dog” is all bark and no bite! And then I am going after Froch!”



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