By Sean McDaniel: Former WBC heavyweight champion Samuel Peter (34-4, 27 KO’s) has a make or break fight on Saturday against unbeaten 6’6″ German based contender Robert Helenius (14-0, 9 KO’s) at the Gerry Weber Stadium, Halle, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany. Helenius, ranked #7 IBF, #7 WBO and #11 WBA, is fighter with the same height and reach as the Klitschko brothers, both of which beat Peter in the past.

However, Helenius isn’t anywhere near as powerful as the Klitschkos and is still pretty much untested. His German handlers must figure Peter to be totally shot for them to risk Helenius’ unbeaten record against him because he’s been carefully matched up until this fight against B and C level fighters. The one time they did put Helenius in with a halfway decent fighter they picked out Lamon Brewster, who looked like a shell of his former self by that point in his career.

Peter, 30, lost his last fight to IBF/WBO heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko by a 10th round TKO in September 2010. Peter seemed to give up when the going got tough early on the fight and just soaked up punishment without putting a huge effort into going after Wladimir like he had in his loss to him in their first fight in 2005. Peter also seemed to lose confidence in himself in his 8th round stoppage loss to Vitali Klitschko in 2008, in a fight where Peter lost his title. Peter initially tried to get at Vitali in the first few rounds but then basically did nothing after the 3rd. If Peter is willing to take some early punishment from Helenius, he has an excellent chance of knocking out the big 6’6″ fighter. Helenius is beatable but Peter has to remain calm and committed towards going after him as fast as possible.