Is anyone REALLY suprised that Froch beat Bute ??

[Final round]

I surprised TBH.

As much as a I like Froch, I thought Bute might just be slightly too good for him, but how wrong I was.

I'm especially shocked at how easily Froch dismantled Bute.

It seems as if the high calibre of opponent, plus the travelling really helped Froch.

Bute didn't do the Super Six as we know (now we might know why) & he has been in a relative comfort zone compared to Froch in recent times.

Carl was brilliant last night & deserves all the praise he is getting.

He was and he does, forget the revisionism. An awesome performance, transformed from the Froch who was against Johnson and Ward

[Horse]

I was thinking more from bute's point of view!! Where does he go from here?? He's 33 this year and if surely a rematch infront of his home fans must be a better payday than fightsomet couple of bums and trying to rebuild his reputation...?? As from froch's side of things If not Kessler he may as well just retire as anything else would be a step back....p.s if lastnights froch's had turned up he would have beaten Kessler handily first time out (his jab worked a treat lastnight and bute's was non-existent...

If he can't get a fight with Kessler he should retire?

There are plenty of good fights for Froch. Kessler is the best next fight for him, but there are about 10 other opponents he could face that would be good.

[states]

I'm not surprised he won, no. I felt he could do that, although I thought he'd have to suffer to do it, probably after falling behind on points. That's not especially because I felt Bute was so good (although I did think he'd looked good coming into this fight), it just seemed a reasonable assumption after following Froch his whole career, given that he's never made a fight look easy against good opposition, with the exception of Abraham. I don't mean that as a knock on him either, it's just the way he's been.

I was surprised he did it so easily though. Bute having a terrible last round against Andrade was one thing, getting battered from pillar to post was another altogether.

[xrgcx]

No but i thought it was very 50/50 and was surprised how much froch dominated

Agree

[Bricks]

Yes loads of people, check out the predictions thread, he was the bookies underdog and much of the press were ringing the death nell for Froch.

Froch did fantastic against a man considered top drawer; In truth; Bute did not belong in the same ring as Froch who stood in range and rattled Bute every time he connected. A very good win for Carl but; on this showing; Bute would have got his arse handed to him by anyone in the top 5 at super middle. It took someone with Frochs guts and skill to show him the door. Bute was exposed at the very top level, Carl had a fantastic night and I think will beat Kessler in a rematch but imagine Ward will always be too much for him. What a fighter Froch is though!

Respectfully I cant agree at all with the kind of opinion along the line of "oh we all thought Bute was going to humiliate Froch end his career but now Froch looked like the second coming it must be because Bute was poor all long and Ward will still always have too much for him.........

I still think Bute on his best night beats most the supersix including Ward. Styles make fights, and i really beleive it was Froch who was having an off night against Ward and would beat him if in the form he has been for all his other super 6/bute fights and if the fight is in Nottingham.

[forcefraser]

Yes loads of people, check out the predictions thread, he was the bookies underdog and much of the press were ringing the death nell for Froch.

Froch did fantastic against a man considered top drawer; In truth; Bute did not belong in the same ring as Froch who stood in range and rattled Bute every time he connected. A very good win for Carl but; on this showing; Bute would have got his arse handed to him by anyone in the top 5 at super middle. It took someone with Frochs guts and skill to show him the door. Bute was exposed at the very top level, Carl had a fantastic night and I think will beat Kessler in a rematch but imagine Ward will always be too much for him. What a fighter Froch is though!

Respectfully I cant agree at all with the kind of opinion along the line of "oh we all thought Bute was going to humiliate Froch end his career but now Froch looked like the second coming it must be because Bute was poor all long and Ward will still always have too much for him.........

I still think Bute on his best night beats most the supersix including Ward. Styles make fights, and i really beleive it was Froch who was having an off night against Ward and would beat him if in the form he has been for all his other super 6/bute fights and if the fight is in Nottingham.

Froch is at his best when he bullies the opponent and keeps them under pressure. He needs to engage them in a shootout. The problem with a guy like Ward is that he looks too good to allow this to happen.

froch can box, but he can also be outboxed by a skillfull fighter like Ward. Without doubt he is at his best when he drags them into the trenches like with Pascal and Bute. If you look at the Taylor fight and Direll, he was not doing well at all as he was trying to box the boxer.

[davie]

Im not surprised that he beat Bute but I am surprised how easily he did it. Someone mentioned Jeff Lacy the other day on another thread and I think that summed up Bute pretty well. The Super Six has meant that Bute has only been fighting b level fighters at best which has meant he has never fought a real world class opponent until now which has lead to him being not very battle hardened at all. I never like to go by body language in the final stages before a fight but Bute looked like he was bricking it when he turned up at the arena.

i thought this myself. and he never looked like he fancied it throughout

there was a lot of staring at the camera that seemed very put on, like he was trying to convince himself he was up for it

to answer the question, yes i was (pleasantly) surprized at the win and the nature of it, i (grudgingly) predicted a points win for bute

i wasn't swayed by hype, i had watched bute defend a world title against a few decent contenders, although aware he often wasn't defending against propper world class, he was still fighting world title fights and totally outclassing opposition. that often leads you to believe someone is a very good world level operator. thier was no way of proving or disproving that he was at the very top of course, as he hadn't fought the best. but it wasn't that great a stretch of the imagination going on what you see happening in the ring. christ some on here yesterday predicted prtice has all the tools to go on and dominate like the klitschkos, based on watching him fight brittish level fighters. sometimes you make judgements based on the level of ability you see displayed, regardless of the level of opponent

froch on the other hand came up well short in his last outing, again you may point to the level of opposition, but he was outclassed, albeit by the best in the division, as i said there was no way of disproving that bute wasn't also near that kind of level
and if froch had approached the fight the way he approached the ward fight while bute had come in with the confidence he does against lesser opponents in canada bute would have won.
thankfully froch got it spot on.
if froch takes that approach he used last night in any possible rematch with ward, he might just find success

anyhoo, i've waffled and wandered quite a bit their, the point i'm trying to make is.....
it really wasn't that outrageous a conclusion to come to that froch may just lose this fight,
so to the hahah told you so brigade, i'm happy i've been proven wrong. well done on your prediction chaps

[davie]

No-one will want to see it again.


Kessler vs froch 2 please

as long as bute can recover mentally, then he'd have home advantage and i'd happily watch it again.

i reckon it'd be a lot closer, but after viewing saturday nights fight it'd be folly to predict anything but another froch win, but not as emphatic

of course if butes head isn't right going into it, it could get messy

personally i'd like to see him fight kessler next

[jessi]

No-one will want to see it again.


Kessler vs froch 2 please

as long as bute can recover mentally, then he'd have home advantage and i'd happily watch it again.

i reckon it'd be a lot closer, but after viewing saturday nights fight it'd be folly to predict anything but another froch win, but not as emphatic

of course if butes head isn't right going into it, it could get messy

personally i'd like to see him fight kessler next

X2

[jessi]

Thought he looked nervous when Johnny Nelson went to see him in the gym (a lot of jumping around and fake smiles) I thought he would give froch a tough fight, I was abit supprised he was the favourite though, but to answer your question, no not supprised Carl won, but no one could of thought he would win so easily

[nobby_nobbins]

I always used to think Froch would beat Bute but changed my mind recently because I thought Froch was in serious decline. I'm now so impressed by Froch that I would back him to knock out Kessler and would not even rule him out in a rematch with Ward, particularly if that fight took place in Nottingham.

[JC]

I had it about 60/40 in Bute's favour so I was surprised but not shocked. As everyone has said it's more the manner of the victory that's surprising.

It's easy to say with hindsight that Bute hadn't really been tested but you have to remember he was coming off a more comfortable win over Johnson that Froch had managed in his previous fight.

[JC]

I always used to think Froch would beat Bute but changed my mind recently because I thought Froch was in serious decline. I'm now so impressed by Froch that I would back him to knock out Kessler and would not even rule him out in a rematch with Ward, particularly if that fight took place in Nottingham.

Don't let one win blind you, styles make fights. I can't see Froch Ward II going much different from the first fight regardless of home advantage.

[damianhucker1]

No-one will want to see it again.


Kessler vs froch 2 please

as long as bute can recover mentally, then he'd have home advantage and i'd happily watch it again.

i reckon it'd be a lot closer, but after viewing saturday nights fight it'd be folly to predict anything but another froch win, but not as emphatic

of course if butes head isn't right going into it, it could get messy

personally i'd like to see him fight kessler next

While i agree with your post overall , hasnt Kessler now moved up to Light heavy ?

So id say id like him to Fight Stieglitz in a unification fight , but if Adonis Stevenson is made mandatory ill be happy with that too as i could envisage another fight like Froch vs Pascal .

[Adamj1987]

No-one will want to see it again.


Kessler vs froch 2 please

as long as bute can recover mentally, then he'd have home advantage and i'd happily watch it again.

i reckon it'd be a lot closer, but after viewing saturday nights fight it'd be folly to predict anything but another froch win, but not as emphatic

of course if butes head isn't right going into it, it could get messy

personally i'd like to see him fight kessler next

While i agree with your post overall , hasnt Kessler now moved up to Light heavy ?

So id say id like him to Fight Stieglitz in a unification fight , but if Adonis Stevenson is made mandatory ill be happy with that too as i could envisage another fight like Froch vs Pascal .

yeah id like froch-stieglitz and i thought stevenson was already mandatory

[damianhucker1]

as long as bute can recover mentally, then he'd have home advantage and i'd happily watch it again.

i reckon it'd be a lot closer, but after viewing saturday nights fight it'd be folly to predict anything but another froch win, but not as emphatic

of course if butes head isn't right going into it, it could get messy

personally i'd like to see him fight kessler next

While i agree with your post overall , hasnt Kessler now moved up to Light heavy ?

So id say id like him to Fight Stieglitz in a unification fight , but if Adonis Stevenson is made mandatory ill be happy with that too as i could envisage another fight like Froch vs Pascal .

yeah id like froch-stieglitz and i thought stevenson was already mandatory

you may be correct , just thought id read he was only ranked number 2 and wasnt officially mandatory yet as number 1 was vacant .

[Greavesy]

I think Bute had an off day ,
might have been the weight but i think the rematch will happen .

[gobbles]

If you walked down an alley and got bashed up like that would you go down that alley again?

Froch v Ward II makes more sense

Doesn't make any sense to Ward

[leforge]

like to see Kessler next. The Arena was rocking Saturday priviledge to be their!

[Shirow]

I was very pleasantly surprised that Froch dragged him into the trenches so soon and also that there wasn't a huge speed discrepancy. I was expecting this to look like the Jermaine Taylor fight with Bute frustrating him with speed and skills and being stalked to a late TKO or points loss.

What made this so anticipated was that we couldn't truly judge Bute's level. He had been looking just as good as Ward & Froch in his non-super 6 matches but against a much lower level of opponent. I suspected that he was at his ceiling when i noticed that Brian Magee made him look a little uncomfortable a couple of times so maybe anyone better would give him real problems. I thought that Old Man Johnson might give him that acid test but that ended up being the day Glen's age finally caught up with him.

I think that erasing the Kessler loss at home followed by a Ward rematch if can get it to try and reverse both of his losses like Lennox did would be the best way to go.

Saw him on BBC breakfast this morning and he came across very well too.

[nobby_nobbins]

I always used to think Froch would beat Bute but changed my mind recently because I thought Froch was in serious decline. I'm now so impressed by Froch that I would back him to knock out Kessler and would not even rule him out in a rematch with Ward, particularly if that fight took place in Nottingham.

Don't let one win blind you, styles make fights. I can't see Froch Ward II going much different from the first fight regardless of home advantage.

I would favour Ward as well but Froch is a difficult fighter to predict. He is smarter and more adaptable than his blood and guts image suggests. He's never going to be significantly faster of hand and foot and that's always going to hurt him against Ward, but he is very good at finding solutions to problems using the modest gifts that he has. Ward will be a big favourite and deservedly so, but like I said, I wouldn't rule Froch out.

[mfc_se15]

like to see Kessler next. The Arena was rocking Saturday priviledge to be their!

Was a weird one I thought atmosphere wise. Seemed to get going a bit pre Frampton, then died as the fight went on longer than I think some expected. Then pre the boxers coming out it was all the Bute fans you could hear really, with token attempts from different sections of the arena attempting to drown them out. When Froch came out was when everyone seemed to wake up and from then on the atmopshere was brilliant.

[antcull]

It was the manner of the victory that was so surprising. I still haven't come across a serious and legit prediction from an article/forum post or whatever that predicted an early or earlyish KO for Froch, barely even KO predictions at all for either man tbh.

There have always been reservations about Butes defence and the ability to withstand punishment from the top class guys but the one thing that really surprised me was how little Butes attacks fazed Froch. I really did rate his offensive ability and power.. (still do, although not quite as highly) Some of the shots and combinations that Bute had landed against the plethora of B-list opponents hes faced over the last few years really did suggest that Froch would be in for a world of hurt......win or lose.......But there wasn't even one shot that seemed to effect him at all, none that made him deviate from his plan or hold back a little.

How he approached the fight was pretty amazing when you think of it.....He started pretty carefully against nearly all the top notch opponents hes faced recently but against Bute he decided to stalk his man, hands down and left himself pretty open to damage himself because he KNEW that this is what he had to do, he knew that at all costs he needed to seriously apply the pressure to Bute.

The victory shouldn't be surprising, but the performance and the way he went about it definitely is. It was superb.