By Sean McDaniel: You can’t exactly say that former WBC super middleweight champion Carl Froch (26-1, 20 KO’s) is shy about voicing his feelings about his recent 12 round unanimous decision loss to the new World Boxing Council super middleweight champion Mikkel Kessler (43-2, 32 KO’s) last Saturday night in Herning, Denmark. Fighting in front of a large Danish crowd, Kessler ended up beating Froch by a narrow 12 round decision.
However, Froch was none too pleased with suffering his first loss of his career and has been vocal about voicing his displeasure about the decision. In an article at the Sun, Froch got right to the point, saying “I felt I was ripped off by the judges in Denmark and I don’t want it to happen in Germany. All I want is a fair crack at the whip when it comes to a points verdict.”
Froch believes that he would have beat Kessler had the fight taken place in Froch’s home city of Nottingham, England. However, Froch has to accept the defeats, because all of the fighters in the Super Six tournament will eventually have to fight in another fighters’ home city. Andre Ward won’t have to travel during the group stage competition but he likely will in the semi finals of the tournament.
Froch says “I’d have to knockout Kessler to get a decision in Denmark.” I think Froch doesn’t realize how close the fight really was, because a lot of boxing fans felt that Kessler won the fight because of his aggressiveness and better ring skills. The decision wasn’t anything close to being a rip off. It wouldn’t have been a rip off even if Froch had won the fight. It was a fight that was basically more or less a toss-up at the end. I can see how the judges might have felt that Kessler deserved the win because he was the aggressor all the way through the fight, whereas Froch came forward in certain rounds of the fight and wasn’t consistent about it.
Besides being not happy with the scoring of his fight, Froch learned after the bout that he will have to travel to Berlin, Germany in his next Super Six tournament fight to go up against Arthur Abraham. Froch’s promoter had a verbal agreement that the fight would take place in Nottingham, and not Germany. Froch says “My next fight in August will take place in England. There is an agreement in place and I expect the [Super Six] series organizers to honor it.”
However, if they don’t agree with it, Froch is threatening to pull out of the Super Six tournament altogether. Froch says, “If Abraham doesn’t come to England, as far as I’m concerned, the fight is off.” The next move will be for the series organizers. Perhaps they can let Froch have his way, since he feels strongly about this and would really make a mess of the tournament if he pulls out of the fight.
“A win against Abraham will put me right back in it. If I win my next three fights I will be the undisputed champion.” Right now, Froch should be thinking one thing at a time. He didn’t look quite good enough against Kessler to be talking about such lofty goals like this. He needs to work on his defense, punch output and hand speed, because those were glaring problems for him against Kessler.
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