By Barry Holbrook: George Groves feels Chris Eubank Jr’s size will carry him to victory in his middleweight fight against welterweight Conor Benn on Oct. 8.
Benn has a catchweight of 157 pounds and a 10-pound rehydration clause to give him an edge, but Groves has doubts if that will be enough to beat Eubank Jr.
Groves says the only chance Benn (21-0, 14 KOs) has to win is if Eubank Jr is totally exhausted and doesn’t train hard due to fighting a welterweight. It remains to be seen if the handicap will help the 25-year-old Benn.
What really hurts Benn in this fight is his lack of experience fighting quality opponents. His promoter has been pitting him against horrible enemies at 147, since he doesn’t have the benefit of an amateur career.
Benn has been making easy money fighting veterans like Chris Algieri, Adrian Granados, Samuel Vargas, Sebastian Formella and Chris Van Heerden.
The money has been so good that Hearn hasn’t been in a hurry to start pitting Benn against live opposition, so he comes into the Eubank Jr fight ill-prepared to win. The only thing Benn has is the catchweight of 157 pounds and the rehydration clause.
Benn’s management has set up a double weight handicap for him to try to make up for his lack of experience and size for the fight against former IBO 168-pound champion Eubank Jr.
“If Eubank is severely drained of weight, tired and taking it easy because he thinks he’s fighting a welterweight or whatever,” George Groves told iFL TV when asked how Conor Benn can beat Chris Eubank Jr. on October 8.
If you’re not absolutely right. Benn has to get in there and put him under pressure and make him work, go to the body and go for a big punch,” Groves continued on what Benn needs to do to defeat Eubank Jr.
“Eubank has a good chin, great engine, good work rate, very strong, decent power, hand speed is fine. He’s made some technical changes since I fought him, now he works with [Roy] jones.
We will see if they are beneficial or not. I like Connor. I’ve always been a fan of Conor and I’ve always appreciated Conor. I have to say it’s an uphill battle for him. I think size wins at night.
“What is rehydration? Ten pounds is what you have to do with the IBF world title fight. Rehydration is what to weigh the next morning. They will be weighed at noon and, the next morning, at 10:00 am, they will carry out the dehydration weigh-in.
“That means you can still put on another ten pounds between then and fight night by the time you get to the ring. You have to be careful what you are going to play during the night. It may mean that you slept through the night, but maybe not.
“Eubank puts on eleven pounds, sleeps well at night, loses two pounds and a little jogging in the morning takes off half a pound, makes the weight and then hydrates.
“I don’t see that Conor Benn can. He’s not dropping ten pounds for the weigh-in when he’s just moved up two weight divisions. Eubank could weigh more than 15 pounds than him that night, which is a lot,” Groves said.
