By Scott Gilfoid: Paul Smith (31-2, 17 KO’s) is a man on a mission coming to win back his British super middleweight title against British and Commonwealth super middleweight champion George Groves (13-0, 10 KO’s) next week on November 5th at the Wembley Arena. Smith lost his British title in a 9th round TKO defeat at the hands of the talented but flawed James DeGale last December.

Smith said to thesun.co.uk “My son kept asking me where the belt was and I had a terrible time trying to explain to him that I’d lost it to DeGale. I’m determined to take back what I think is rightfully mine when I face Groves. Then I’ll be putting it under the Christmas tree for my lad to open on December 25.”

Smith, 5’11”, will be giving away a little in the way of height against the 5’11 ½” Groves. Although both fighters are listed at around the same height, Groves looks to be at least a couple of inches taller than Smith. This probably will be a meaningless statistic because Groves won’t be able to capitalize on his size advantage if he chooses to move a lot like he did against DeGale.

The only place where Groves can have an advantage is if he were to stand on the outside and use his jab to pile up points. But Groves isn’t much of a jabber and tends to do most of his work with flurries. He changed all that up in his fight against DeGale last time out, so it’s hard to tell what Groves will do in this fight. Smith is the stronger fighter with the bigger punch. But Smith has to force Groves to fight him because he’ll struggle if he allows Groves to steal rounds with his hit and run tactics.