By Scott Gilfoid: The long awaited James DeGale (20-1, 14 KOs) vs. Andre Dirrell (24-1, 16 KO) clash is only 12 days away for their fight on May 23rd for Carl Froch’s old IBF super middleweight title at the Agganis Arena, in Boston, Massachusetts, USA.
Froch didn’t want to defend his IBF title against DeGale, so now we have DeGale-Dirrell as a result of that. But even if Froch had defended his title against DeGale and subsequently beat him, Froch would still be staring in the face of Dirrell, a fighter who gave Froch huge problems six years ago in the Super Six tournament in 2009.
Dirrell basically beat Froch every which way he could and found himself on the receiving end of a good old fashioned hometown decision. As such, I think Froch would have vacated his IBF title once he got past DeGale because if he didn’t, he’d be facing Dirrell, and he’s clearly all wrong for Froch.
DeGale is going to be at a big disadvantage against Dirrell because he’s not much faster than Froch, and he has the same flat-footed fighting style. DeGale tries to fight in a slick manner, but his lack of hand speed causes him to get hit way too much. He’s done well recently after his management backed him off from fighting quality opposition after he suffered a defeat against George Groves in 2011.
The fact that DeGale couldn’t even beat Groves showed you where his ceiling as at talent wise. DeGale’s management were smart to have him take his career backwards against lesser fighters rather than putting him in with better opposition with each fight.
Dirrell has looked magnificent recently with his wins over Dereck Edwards, Nick Brinson, Vladine Biosse and Michael Gbenga. In those fights, Dirrell showed that he not only still has it in terms of his skills, but he seems to have improved. Dirrell’s punching power has gotten better, and he’s sitting down on his punches now and fighting with a lot more aggression now compared to in the past.
That makes Dirrell a lot more dangerous because he’s already got amazing hand speed going for him, but his new power and aggression makes him even dangerous. Dirrell switched fighting stances constantly in his recent one-sided 12 round decision win over Edwards. Dirrell showed in that fight that he could fight just as good out of the southpaw stance as he could in fighting in the orthodox stance.
DeGale is going to need some kind of a plan-B to fall back on in this fight if things go as badly for him as I expect them to. Without hand and foot speed, DeGale is going to be in a world of hurt against Dirrell. There’s not much DeGale will be able to do against a talent like Dirrell because he’s not going to be able to develop these attributes during training camp. You’re either born with a high degree of fast twitch fibers in your muscles are you don’t.
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