By Scott Gilfoid: Well, it seems former IBF/WBA super middleweight champion Carl Froch (33-2, 24 KOs) still is a little peeved at him not getting credit from boxing fans for his foul-plagued win six years ago in his hometown of Nottingham, UK, against the talented American Andre Dirrell (24-1, 16 KOs) on October 17th, 2009.
Froch lashed out at Dirrell in a column at SkySports.com today, saying that Dirrell isn’t “manly” and that he “comes across as a coward.”
Oh, such a pity that Froch appears to still harbor bad blood about what many boxing fans saw as the robbery in Nottingham with what they feel was a hometown decision Froch was given. The thing is Froch could have cleared up the controversy by facing Dirrell again in a rematch, but like with Froch’s loss to Andre Ward, he never opted to fight Dirrell ever again.
Now Froch is stuck on the sidelines as Dirrell faces his fellow countryman James DeGale (20-1, 14 KOs) this Saturday night on May 23rd at the Agganis Arena, in Boston, Massachusetts, USA. Dirrell and DeGale will be fighting for Froch’s IBF 168lb title, the one that he gave up rather than face DeGale. Froch is pulling for DeGale to win the fight for some reason.
I’m not sure why it would matter to Froch because he gains nothing if DeGale wins the fight. Froch has already said that he won’t fight DeGale if he beats Dirrell. But it is strange that Froch is pulling for DeGale to win, because it makes you wonder if Froch is still upset about his controversial win over Dirrell. I mean, with a lot of boxing fans still seeing Froch’s win over Dirrell as a gift decision, I could see how it might still be an old wound that Froch has.
“He’s [Dirrell] just not a very manly man, the way he ran and held against me and the way he seemed to throw himself on the floor against Arthur Abraham,” Froch said via Skysports.com. “I genuinely hope DeGale does a job on him.”
The question here is does Froch want DeGale to do the job he couldn’t do himself against Dirrell? Is that it? I mean, I’m trying to understand why Froch would be so keyed up to the point where he wants DeGale to do a job on Dirrell. Is it because Froch couldn’t do it himself and now getting back at Dirrell via proxy? I don’t see how Froch comes out ahead if DeGale does the job on Dirrell that he couldn’t do himself. To be sure, Froch can live vicariously through what DeGale is doing in the ring, but what good is it if you didn’t do it yourself? I just don’t see where Froch gains anything from DeGale doing what he failed to do without controversy.
If you saw the Froch-Dirrell fight live in 2009, or watched a replay of it, you’ll notice that Froch rarely landed anything at all in the fight. He was missing all night long with his shots. He got away with a lot of fouling in the fight, in particular rabbit punches thrown to the back of Dirrell’s head. At one point in the fight, Froch threw Dirrell to the canvas right in front of the referee Hector Afu, who did nothing about it in terms of taking a point off. Froch also hit on the break on at least one occasion and wasn’t docked a point. Overall, I thought it was one of the worst refereed fights I’ve ever seen before, I thought Froch should have been docked at least 6 points by the referee, it not disqualified for his constant fouls. But even with all the fouling that Froch got away with, he still barely won the fight by a 12 round split decision. I had Dirrell winning easily 8 rounds to 3 with 1 even. Andre Ward, who later beat Froch in the Super Six tournament, felt that Dirrell was robbed in the fight as well.
As for Froch’s comments about Dirrell not being “manly,” Froch had this to say about Ward in the past via ESPN.co.uk: “Mikkel Kessler is a man’s man, Andre Ward is a spoiler and it’s as simple as that. He tricks his way through a fight and gets the win effectively but not very entertaining and it’s a horrible fight to be involved in.”
It seems that Froch feels that fighters are supposed to stand in front of their opponents looking to slug it out in a primitive fashion that we saw early on in boxing. Unfortunately for Froch, the sport has evolved and the best fighters practice the art of fighting without getting hit. They’re not just going to stand in front of their opponents and get brained with shots. Dirrell is one of the best fighters on the planet, and he doesn’t just stand there in front of his opposition, letting them land shots so that he can show them how tough and how “manly” he is.
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