Kevin Mitchell faces Sebastien Benito tonight in London

By Boxing News - 07/06/2013 - Comments

mitchell23By Scott Gilfoid: Former WBO Inter-Continental lightweight champion Kevin Mitchell (33-2, 24 KO’s) will be back in the ring tonight for the first time in 10 months to face France’s Sebastien Benito (10-6, 3 KO’s) in a fight to get rid of a lot of ring rust at the York Hall in Bethnal Green, London, UK.

Mitchell will no doubt do what he has to do in order to get Benito out of there as quick as possible tonight. Benito comes into the fight having lost his last two bouts this year against little known opposition.

About the most I can see about Benito is that he’s only been stopped twice in his 6 losses, so maybe he might be able to hand around for 10 rounds and soak up punishment against Mitchell to give him some rounds but that’s about all I can see Benito doing.

Mitchell has really got to be a heck of a lot busier with his career because he’s not been really active fighter since 2010. Mitchell fights like a world champion, fighting once, perhaps twice a year. That’s not nearly enough for a contender.

Mitchell has been out of action since being smashed by WBO lightweight champion Ricky Burns last year in a 4th round TKO loss. It wasn’t so much the fact that Mitchell got beaten by Burns, but rather HOW he got beaten. Mitchell was totally dominated by Burns from start to the bitter finish, and he made him look like Mike Tyson despite the fact that Burns isn’t a big puncher.

The way that Mitchell got handled by Burns makes me wonder if Mitchell has anything left in the tank. He looked like a shot fighter to me; although perhaps his talent was always questionable anyway given that he’d been blown apart by Michael Katsidis in only 3 rounds in 2010, and he also had a questionable win over Breidis Prescott in December 2009 in a fight that took place in the UK. I had Prescott winning that fight 9 rounds to 3.

Also on the card will be welterweight John O’Donnell facing Jay Morris. There are four other additional bouts on the card, but no one really well known among the bunch of them.



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