By William Mackay: In typical Carl Froch fashion, he was predicting circumstances for his next Super Six opponent former WBA super middleweight champion Mikkel Kessler, saying in an article at the Sportinglife “I am looking to be the first fighter to take Mikkel Kessler out before the final bell.” Froch and Kessler will be facing one another on April 24th, at the MCH Messecenter Herning, in Herning, Denmark. The bout was originally scheduled for April 17th, but it was moved as of today to the 24th.
Froch, 32, wanted the fight to take place in Copenhagen, Denmark, lobbying hard to make that happen. However, in the end, the fight will be taking place in Herning, which has a larger arena compared to Copenhagen. Froch says “I am upset for my fans with the chance of date, but this has not been preventable due to scheduling issues. I just hope my fans will understand this change and will still come in their thousands to support me in Herning.”
Froch might be a little over ambitious when it comes to the amount of British boxing fans that will be willing to trek all the way to Denmark to see him fight. That’s a long haul, costly and the location of the fight won’t be as easy for fans to get to. If “thousands” of Froch fans do show up to support him against Kessler, I will be very surprised.
Froch says “I have gone to Jermain Taylor’s backyard and defended my belt and I am more than happy to do the same with Kessler. As the champion, I will prove that I can fight and beat the best anywhere.” First of all, there’s a huge difference between Taylor and Kessler. Froch is talking apples and oranges here. Taylor’s chin wasn’t the same after his knockout loss to Kelly Pavlik in 2007, and Froch’s 12th round knockout win over Taylor last year in April has to be seen in that light.
Additionally, Taylor had been suffering stamina problems since 2005, and faded badly in his fight against Froch after knocking him to the canvas in the 3rd and building up a substantial lead during the first six rounds. At the time that Froch stopped Taylor, Froch was behind on the scorecards and needed a knockout to win. And as far as knocking out Kessler goes, if his last opponent Andre Ward couldn’t do it, then I can’t see Froch getting the job done against him.
Ward is a lot faster than Froch, punches as hard and has a better arsenal of punches. Yet Ward pounded away at Kessler for 12 rounds, beating him much worse than Joe Calzaghe had done in his 12 round decision win over Kessler in 2007. Froch won’t likely be able to do what Ward couldn’t so. If anything, Froch needs to be content to just try and win the fight. If he goes out looking for a knockout, he’s only going to slow down his already painfully slow punches even more and make it easier for Kessler to pound his face and distort his features.
Kessler lost his World Boxing Association super middleweight title in an 11 round technical decision to Ward in November 2009. Kessler was cut over both eyes from a series of head butts from Ward. The blood dripping into Kessler’s eyes made it difficult for him to see and he began to get hit a lot by Ward. However, Ward dominated virtually every moment of the fight and never had any problems with the slower Kessler.
For his part, Froch defeated American Andre Dirrell in the stage 1 Super Six tournament competition in October. Froch looked out of his league for most of the fight until turning the bout physical in the 2nd half of the bout, throwing Dirrell to the canvas in a wrestling move at one point, and using other rough stuff to try and put Dirrell off his game. Froch ended up winning by a 12 round split decision. However, many boxing fans felt that Dirrell should have won the fight.
Kessler is optimistic about his chances against Froch, saying “With the support of my great Danish fans, I will defeat Carl Froch and become world champion again.”
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