By Scott Gilfoid: EBU super middleweight champion James DeGale (14-0, 9 KO’s) will have a tough test on January 26th against challenger Mouhamed Ali Ndiaye (22-1, 13 KO’s) at the Glow, Bluewater, Greenhithe, Kent, United Kingdom.

This shouldn’t be a tough test but for DeGale it probably will be because he has a problem of not being able to fight hard for the full three minutes of every round, and this isn’t the fighter that you want to be getting lazy against because Ndiaye can punch a little. DeGale, 26, has looked lazy in his last two fights against Fulgencio Zuniga and Hadillah Mohoumadi.

Indeed, DeGale spent almost the entire fight against Mohoumadi with his against the ropes playing a sick kind of rope-a-dope but doing an awfully poor job of it. DeGale won the fight but it was a heck of a lot closer than the judges’ scores handed down.

DeGale supposedly wasn’t going to spend time on the ropes for his recent fight against Zuniga, but sure enough he was back on the ropes and he took a lot of punishment because of that. DeGale was okay when the action was in the center of the ring against Zuniga but he had problems each time he’d go to the ropes.

Ndiaye, 33, hasn’t lost a fight since he was beaten by Lolenga Mock back in 2008. Ndiaye has won his last nine fights and looked good in doing so. He beat Jose Maria Guerrero in his last fight in stopping him in the 9th round.

DeGale is going to need to try and stop Ndiaye because this guy will be testing his chin all night long, and we could see a minor upset if he’s allowed to stay in there too long. I see DeGale as the better fighter in this bout but not by a whole lot. Ndiaye has the power to make up for his lack of speed and ring movement in this fight, and I think he can win it if DeGale gets lazy in this fight.