Kell Brook says that his move up to Middleweight to face Gennady Golovkin will bring out the best in him as they clash for the WBC, IBF and IBO World titles at The O2 on Saturday night, live on Sky Sports Box Office.
Unbeaten IBF Welterweight champ Brook has made the move to 160lbs to land the blockbuster fight he’s been looking for since ripping the crown he holds from Shan Porter in August 2014.
Naseem Hamed lit up the featherweight division like no other British fighter ever did, and “Prince” Naz, although a loser in the biggest fight of his thrilling career – against Mexican great Marco Antonio Barrera – ranks as one of the best British fighters of recent years. Today long since retired (and carrying so much weight he is almost unrecognisable from the sleek and lethal 126-pound puncher he was in the 1990s/early 2000s) Hamed remains a fight fan.
Retired former super-middleweight king and current Sky Sports pundit Carl Froch has weighed-in with his thoughts on this Saturday’s massively intriguing Gennady Golovkin-Kell Brook fight and, though Froch does not go so far as to say his countryman will get the win, he does say that unbeaten pound-for-pound star GGG is in for the “toughest fight of his career so far.”
Froch sparred an up and coming Book back in 2009, as he was getting ready to fight Andre Direll in the “Super-Six” tournament, and though the spar was a long time ago, Froch remembers it well and feels that the problems he had nailing Brook, and avoiding his right hand, could be obstacles GGG has trouble with also.
Weight, size, and size again. These have been two of the big talking points ahead of the big fight that is now just five days away: Gennady Golovkin Vs. Kell Brook. Initially, when the fight was first (shockingly) announced, to the, well, shock of practically everyone, the cry was, ‘Oh, Brook is a welterweight! He is too small for GGG.’ Well, since then, and as a result of some serious training, IBF 147-pound champ Brook has bulked up to middleweight – actually tipping-in at 167-pounds at last week’s check-weight.
This change to Brook’s physique has forced some fans (mostly British fans, it must be said) to change their opinion on the big fight. Brook himself has said a number of times that fans, and GGG, will be shocked and surprised by his size and strength on fight night. And today, when speaking with Sky Sports, the undefeated middleweight king said himself how impressed he is with Brook’s physical appearance.
British boxing is buzzing right now, over two things: the imminent super-fight we can look forward to seeing this Saturday, and the very prescence of the star of the fight. Middleweight king Gennady Golovkin has touched down in london and fans cannot wait to see him do his stuff at the o2 arena against Kell Brook.
As much as british fans are supporting brook and genuinely want him to win, there is something special, regal even, about ggg being in town. A few good judges are giving brook a shot at winning on Saturday, but the overwhelming majority of fight people are basically looking forward to seeing a Golovkin showcase.
Gennady Golovkin is a fighter who has proven so dominant he has even taken to letting an opponent stick around for a few extra rounds before lowering the boom on him, and GGG has even dropped his hands and let a foe punch him in the face. So special a fighter Golovkin is, his admirers say, he has yet to get out of second gear in any pro fight. Winning with something to spare is what GGG has been doing, consistently, and his potential rivals (who are few and far between) have been impressed/intimidated enough to want to stay away from him.
But what if GGG does struggle, look bad or gest genuinely hurt in a fight? Would his cowering would-be rivals come out of hiding and agree to face the middleweight king if he looked less than formidable? GGG is so desperate to get the big, big fight with Saul Canelo Alvarez that he said to The Los Angles Times how he might intentionally look less than great against Kell Brook on Saturday, so as to lure Canelo into fighting him.
Kell Brook is shooting for boxing history and if he can somehow pull off a win over middleweight king Gennady Golovkin in just six days’ time, his place in the history books will certainly be secure. And Brook, the IBF welterweight ruler, is watching the very best in the history of the sport as he gets ready, mentally, for the biggest fight of his life. Brook is a huge admirer of the two Sugar Rays, Robinson and Leonard, and he points to their great middleweight victories as his inspiration.
Robinson, generally ranked as the finest welteweight of all time, moved up to 160-pounds and dethroned the unimaginably tough Jake La Motta to take his second world title, while Leonard, a man who has just been ranked by Ring Magazine as the greatest living fighter, became a three-weight king when he upset Marvelous Marvin Hagler to take the middleweight crown.
Big Bear Lake, California/Sheffield, England (September 2, 2016) Boxing Superstar and Unified Middleweight World Champion Gennady “GGG” Golovkin, (35-0, 32 KO’s) and Undefeated British Boxing Star and Welterweight World Champion “The Special One” Kell Brook, (36-0, 25KO’s) have both weighed in within the World Boxing Council’s (‘WBC’) required 7-day limits heading into their highly anticipated international showdown at The O2 on Saturday, September 10 in London, England.
Say what you want about the Gennady Golovkin-Kell Brook fight, but don’t forget that everyone is talking about it! Everyone, and I mean everyone, has an opinion on this fight – a marvellous promotion that has brought a genuine buzz, not only to British boxing, but to world boxing – and the September 10 showdown has to be looked at as one of the biggest fights of the year.
Sugar Ray Leonard has thought about this fight and how it will play out, so too have the likes of Carl Froch, Tony Bellew, Naseem Hamed, Martin Murray, Carson Jones, David Haye and Amir Khan. But one man whose opinion has not perhaps been sought out as much as it should have been is Sheffield’s Clinton Woods, the former long-reigning IBF light-heavyweight champion. Now running his own gym in The Steel City, Woods – who fought his own super fights against the likes of Roy Jones Junior, Glen Johnson and Antonio Tarver – says he has “a feeling” about the upcoming fight.
Unified middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin will face welterweight Kell Brook on Sept 10 in what is being billed as a middleweight championship bout. This upcoming fight has a lot of boxing fans talking, many of them passionately. The debate largely centers around whether or not Brook – a largely unproven welterweight trinket holder – is worthy of facing the middleweight powerhouse better known to most as “Triple G”.