June of this year saw a battle that was a candidate for fight of the year. Jean Pascal 24-1 (16) was coming off a loss in a cracking bout with Carl Froch for the WBC super middleweight title and had moved up to light heavyweight. His opponent for the WBC light heavyweight title was Romanian by birth but fellow Canadian citizen Adrian Diaconu 26-1 (15). What followed was an absorbing 12 rounds of action. Diaconu using his swarming style while Pascal used his speed and brawled when he needed to. At the end of 12 rounds, Pascal was awarded a unanimous decision by scores of 116-112, 116-111 and 115-112, which seemed pretty wide to this writer.
So, now we have the obvious and anticipated rematch. Both fighters reside in Quebec, Canada and the rematch is being held at the Bell Centre, Montreal as was the first bout. Is there anything to suggest a different outcome this time around?
Pascal has been back into the ring since the 1st Diaconu fight and stopped the veteran Italian Silvio Branco in 10 rounds to retain his title. However Pascal wasn’t overly impressive and the 43 year old Branco held his own for much of the bout. Diaconu has not fought since the first bout.
Diaconu i believe has put himself in jeopardy by not having a tune up fight since the first bout. It is my belief that come forward aggressive fighters need to be as active as possible as their style needs timing and accuracy to be as effective as possible. Fighters like Ricky Hatton are never as effective after being champions because they do not fight enough.
As for Pascal, i feel he has now levelled out as a fighter and that he won’t improve much more. He has tremendous speed of hand but at his height will need to fight in the trenches at times as he doesn’t have the reach to keep opponents off at all times.
So what do i expect? Well I can’t see too much difference from the first bout. Both have reasonable but not knockout power and have both have decent chins. Both are fit and are ready for 12 rounds. It really could be argued that this is a pick em fight but i just think Pascal will have that extra edge and win another close decision.
By JIMMY LAST (EDITOR)
