By Scott Gilfoid: Recently, former WBC super middleweight champion Carl Froch (26-1, 20 KO’s) said that he would be using Andre Dirrell’s blueprint he created to beat Froch’s next Super Six tournament opponent Arthur Abraham (31-1, 25 KO’s) when they meet up in September. However, I’m at loss wondering how Froch is going to be able to use the blueprint that Dirrell created for the Abraham fight when Froch doesn’t appear to have any of the same attributes that Dirrell possesses.

Froch is basically a slow plodder, who comes straight forward in a stand up European style of fighting. Froch doesn’t protect his chin and has this nasty habit of fighting with his hands dropped down by his legs, as if they’re totally useless. I can see why he would to fight with a style like that, because he is often able to land shots that his opponents don’t see coming.

However, U.S. fighters are very familiar with Froch’s style of fighting because the style originated in the U.S many years ago and imitated over and over again by young fighters. However, the fighters that typically fight with their hands down by their sides are ones with fast hands, unlike Froch. These fighters can more or less get away with it most of the time without being punished.

Froch is getting hit a lot now that he’s facing quality opposition in the Super Six and his defense isn’t working for him. Froch isn’t going to be able to imitate Dirrell on defense, because Dirrell is smart enough to keep his hands up. Dirrell has lighting fast reflexes and yet he still is wise enough to keep his hands up to protect his chin. Froch isn’t as good at moving around the ring as Dirrell. In fact, Froch moves rather slowly, as if he’s inching along like a giant caterpillar. He’s not very athletic looking and doesn’t glide around the ring like Dirrell.

So I seriously doubt that Froch is going to be able to imitate what Dirrell did when moving around the ring to escape some of Abraham’s heavy shots. Instead of getting out of the way of these big punches like Dirrell did, Froch may find himself having to come up with some other plan if he wants to keep from getting his head chopped off. Moving, leaning his torso at the last second or picking off shots probably isn’t an option for Froch because he doesn’t do any of those things very well.

I’d like to see Froch adopt Dirrell’s style of fighting because it would amusing to see if Froch could actually carry it off. But somehow, I get the picture of a slightly uncoordinated Froch stumbling around the ring, taking heavy shots to the head while he’s trying to move his torso and feet at the last second to avoid a heat seeking blast from Abraham. I just see Froch bumbling along, looking ape-like in his poor imitation of Dirrell’s amazing fighting style and making a complete mess of it. Froch might as well imitate a statue for all the good it would do.

I can just see it. Froch will be getting clobbered over and over again while moving his wooden legs around the ring, and trying to twist away from shots in a painfully slow manner. I think Froch would try to use Dirrell’s style for all of three or four rounds, but as soon as he starts getting majorly clubbed repeatedly, I think Froch will give up on the experiment and revert back to his primitive brawling style and quickly get knocked into the next stratosphere.