Hall of Famer Carl Froch has hit out at a big-name boxer and questioned his right to call himself a world champion.
Froch won multiple super-middleweight world championships in his career between 2002 and 2014 including the WBC twice, the IBF title from 2012 to 2015, and the WBA title between 2013 and 2015.
He has since become a popular pundit and outspoken YouTuber who claims that current IBF heavyweight champion Daniel Dubois, and for that matter whoever wins the all-British heavyweight battle between Anthony Joshua and DDD on September 21, will not rightly be able to call themselves a proper champion.
Usyk was the pervious holder of the belt after he defended it against Tyson Fury in May having initially won it from Anthony Joshua in 2021. He successfully defended it against the Brit in a rematch in 2022, then against Dubois in August last year.
However, he had to vacate the title before his rematch with Fury in December, which Froch thinks means that in essence, he is still the rightful champion. He made that point when speaking to iFL TV.
“Why take the IBF title off Usyk before the rematch with Fury? You know as well as I do it’s politics. They’ve made that title become vacant so AJ Dubois can fight for a title. It’s a f******g paper title mate. It’s not real.”
He then predicted Joshua would win the fight but said the title he would collect for doing so was meaningless.
“Whoever wins that fight between ‘AJ’ and Dubois, and I’m not just giving ‘AJ’ stick here, Dubois as well, ’cause he might chin ‘AJ’, it’s possible, I think AJ wins, but you can’t really call yourself champion. Alright, you’ll have the IBF world belt but the champ is Usyk. That’s it, full stop, there is nothing else to say.”
This argument could become immaterial if the winner of Dubois and Joshua were to then fight the winner of Usyk-Fury as all the belts would be unified once more by the new undisputed champion.
