The Cobra, A True Star
Watching Carl Froch's shut-out masterclass pummelling of feared German opponent Arthur Abraham last night on pay-per-view channel Primetime, I realised I was probably one of under 100,000 in the UK watching it. Looking at the Observer this morning - which usually has pretty good boxing coverage, and went overboard on the Haye-Harrison abomination a fortnight ago - I saw nothing but a tiny paragraph about the fight.
This lack of coverage and recognition has been Froch's bugbear for several years and nothing he has achieved in the meantime seems to have changed it, despite the fact he has put together a boxing CV that dwarfs anyone else in this country. In a highly competitive, admired division, he has defeated in turn Jean Pascal (Future Ring Light Heavyweight Champ), Jermaine Taylor (Former Ring Middleweight Champ), Andre Dirrell (one of the slickest undefeated prospects in US boxing), then lost a controversial decision to former Double Super Middleweight Champ Mikkel Kessler, in what many American writers described as a fight-of-the-year candidate, before humbling former undefeated middleweight champ Abraham last night. I am a big fan of both Haye and Amir Khan but, as yet, neither of them has yet fought a single fighter ranked anywhere near as high as any of those opponents in Boxing's "Pound-for-Pound" ratings.
But everyone's heard of Haye and Khan, and hardly anyone has heard of Froch. Perhaps you haven't. Why is that? He must lack that special something, that star quality.
And yet, Froch is never in a bad fight, they are all thrilling and barnstorming, honest and true, actually worth paying to see. He is a fighter, but also capable of being a boxer, he is granite-chinned and has fists of steel (sorry, resorting to boxing cliche here!).
So he must be a tough sell?
And yet again, Froch is not only full of brag and a great trash talker, he is also articulate, intelligent and also displays a genuine human warmth at times. So far there are no dark secrets, he has a girlfriend and a young son. Looks-wise, well, he's no Ricky Hatton, but who can be?
So, again, why is he not a star?
Boxing is a marginalised sport these days, of course, but people can still get behind its stars in this country - Calzaghe and Lewis were both Sports Personality, Hatton came close, despite hardly ever being on terrestrial TV.
TV - well, that is obviously the answer to the question I'm asking. Not only is Froch not on terrestrial, he is not even on Sky, instead being shown on Primetime. This is because he has shown loyalty to his promoter Mick Hennessy, and is not with the overlord of British boxing Frank Warren. Beyond that, I can only speculate - arguably it's not just loyalty on Froch's part, but good boxing sense, in that Warren's champions often end up not making the big fights in the US, but finding their careers stalling for years with a series of meaningless UK fights - see Calzaghe. Froch leapt straight to the US bigtime, but left UK stardom behind.
And he's from Nottingham, so the local loyal fanbase he has could never be as big as Hatton's or Haye's. He's never headlined a massive UK show, so the hype hasn't quite built up around him.
But that's all boxing, unfortunately - hype, money and luck. Froch has made a serious case in the last couple of years for joining Lewis and Calzaghe amongst the most accomplished British boxers of the last 25 years. From my point of view there is nothing not to like about him, he is endless watchable, endlessly quotable, endlessly durable and admirable. In his triumphant interview last night, he wryly said "maybe one of my fights will be shown on British TV now", but I wouldn't hold out much hope.
This lack of coverage and recognition has been Froch's bugbear for several years and nothing he has achieved in the meantime seems to have changed it, despite the fact he has put together a boxing CV that dwarfs anyone else in this country. In a highly competitive, admired division, he has defeated in turn Jean Pascal (Future Ring Light Heavyweight Champ), Jermaine Taylor (Former Ring Middleweight Champ), Andre Dirrell (one of the slickest undefeated prospects in US boxing), then lost a controversial decision to former Double Super Middleweight Champ Mikkel Kessler, in what many American writers described as a fight-of-the-year candidate, before humbling former undefeated middleweight champ Abraham last night. I am a big fan of both Haye and Amir Khan but, as yet, neither of them has yet fought a single fighter ranked anywhere near as high as any of those opponents in Boxing's "Pound-for-Pound" ratings.
But everyone's heard of Haye and Khan, and hardly anyone has heard of Froch. Perhaps you haven't. Why is that? He must lack that special something, that star quality.
And yet, Froch is never in a bad fight, they are all thrilling and barnstorming, honest and true, actually worth paying to see. He is a fighter, but also capable of being a boxer, he is granite-chinned and has fists of steel (sorry, resorting to boxing cliche here!).
So he must be a tough sell?
And yet again, Froch is not only full of brag and a great trash talker, he is also articulate, intelligent and also displays a genuine human warmth at times. So far there are no dark secrets, he has a girlfriend and a young son. Looks-wise, well, he's no Ricky Hatton, but who can be?
So, again, why is he not a star?
Boxing is a marginalised sport these days, of course, but people can still get behind its stars in this country - Calzaghe and Lewis were both Sports Personality, Hatton came close, despite hardly ever being on terrestrial TV.
TV - well, that is obviously the answer to the question I'm asking. Not only is Froch not on terrestrial, he is not even on Sky, instead being shown on Primetime. This is because he has shown loyalty to his promoter Mick Hennessy, and is not with the overlord of British boxing Frank Warren. Beyond that, I can only speculate - arguably it's not just loyalty on Froch's part, but good boxing sense, in that Warren's champions often end up not making the big fights in the US, but finding their careers stalling for years with a series of meaningless UK fights - see Calzaghe. Froch leapt straight to the US bigtime, but left UK stardom behind.
And he's from Nottingham, so the local loyal fanbase he has could never be as big as Hatton's or Haye's. He's never headlined a massive UK show, so the hype hasn't quite built up around him.
But that's all boxing, unfortunately - hype, money and luck. Froch has made a serious case in the last couple of years for joining Lewis and Calzaghe amongst the most accomplished British boxers of the last 25 years. From my point of view there is nothing not to like about him, he is endless watchable, endlessly quotable, endlessly durable and admirable. In his triumphant interview last night, he wryly said "maybe one of my fights will be shown on British TV now", but I wouldn't hold out much hope.
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