By Scott Gilfoid: George Groves (21-2, 16 KOs) has got a little waiting to do before he gets his title shot against unbeaten WBC super middleweight champion Anthony Dirrell (29-0-1, 22 KOs) later on this year after Dirrell gets his optional title defense out of the way first.
Groves was hoping to get the Dirrell title fight next, but Dirrell was granted a four month extension to get his voluntary defense out of the way first. Groves had a shot at getting a nice little payday fight against #1 IBF James DeGale before the Dirrell fight, but Groves isn’t interested in taking that fight for the purse split that’s being offered to him by DeGale’s promoter Eddie Hearn.
“We’ve got an April fight in mind because I don’t want to get caught off guard,” Groves said via Skysports.com.
Groves is probably going to take another light hitting opponent similar to his last two guys he’s fought in Denis Douglin and Christopher Rebrasse. Those were two relatively easy marks that Groves fought after he was knocked out twice by Carl Froch.
It would be a mistake if Groves were to fight an opponent with a pulse because the chances of him getting beaten would be too high, and he obviously can’t afford another defeat right now if he wants a title shot against Anthony Dirrell.
Groves has got to try and stay upright long enough to get his fight against Anthony Dirrell later this year. With that fight, Groves’ promoters at Sauerland Events are hoping to get it staged in the UK so that Groves will have an advantage.
In turn, that would put Dirrell in a position where he might need a knockout in order to win the fight unless he knocks Groves down multiple times in the fight. It’s hard to win a controversial decision when you’ve been knocked down 3 to 4 times in a fight.
“We were shocked to hear that he [Dirrell] had got the four-month extension in making his mandatory defense,” Groves said to ESPN. “It’s not cut and dry. There’s some stuff that needs to be explained a bit better, so my promoters are talking to the WBC. I don’t think it’s fair on me and I want some answers,” Groves said.
Well, in talking about fairness, you can make an argument that the World Boxing Council made a questionable moving in letting Groves fight in their WBC 168 pound eliminator bout following Groves’ back to back knockout losses to Froch.
If Groves wants to talk to the WBC about some things, he should start with the WBC’s rationale for letting him fight in an eliminator bout after his consecutive defeats to Froch. I mean, is it standard for the WBC to let contenders fight in eliminator bouts after they’ve been knocked out in back to back fights, or was that just something that the WBC decided to do in this case?
I’ve personally never heard of a fighter getting put into a position where they’re allowed to fight in an eliminator after they’ve been knocked out in their last two fights. I don’t know, but maybe that’s something the WBC does from time to time. I just don’t remember having seen a situation like that before. Groves fought a guy named Christopher Rebrasse in the WBC eliminator to earn a shot against Dirrell.
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