By Scott Gilfoid: Former super middleweight world champion Joe Calzaghe is giving Carl Froch (28-2, 20 KO’s) a good chance of beating IBF super middleweight champion Lucian Bute (30-0, 24 KO’s) on May 26th in their fight in Nottingham due to the huge pro-Froch crowd that is expected to turn out for the fight.

Calzaghe said to thesun.co.uk “Bute’s definitely the favorite but how advantage counts for a lot. If Froch can drag him [Bute] into a war and make it a toe-to-toe affair, I can see the crowd spurring him on to the win…It’s going to be a tough, tough night, but I think Froch has got a chance.”

I think Calzaghe is missing the point here. If Froch draws Bute into a huge war, it’s going to hurt Froch big time rather than help him because his chances of running into a big shot will skyrocket. Froch doesn’t have huge power, Bute down. As such, the more Froch looks to slug it out with Bute the better the chances are for the one-punch knockout artist Bute to end it with a single shot to the body or the chin.

Froch, with his low guard, will give Bute plenty of opportunities to land his big shots and put him out of his misery. It doesn’t matter whether Froch’s fans are screaming and singing their loud football songs of support for him; what matters if that Froch is going to be going down big time when Bute connects with one of his hard shots to Froch’s body or head.

Froch won’t be able to stand up to Bute’s power long if he gets a war with this guy. Calzaghe doesn’t seem to recognize how powerful Bute truly is, because if he did he’d be giving Froch zero chance of winning this fight. It’s not quite zero. Froch can win if he score a knockout, but I can’t see him getting to Bute before he gets to him first.

I don’t even think a prime Calzaghe would stand a chance against Bute. Calzaghe would be dancing around the ring trying to trying to throw a lot of punches and he’d end up getting stretched once Bute connects with one of his big body shots.