1) Bad blood
Although they have since made up and nowadays attend dinner shows together, and appear on podcasts, make no mistake about it: neither Froch nor Groves, chalk and cheese in terms of personalities, had a good word to say about the other for several years.
2) Perfect timing
It would have been easy for Groves to have waited, or for Froch to have stubbornly denied his rival the shot, but both, to their credit, made the fight happen when it was at its most appealing.
3) Meet me in the middle
One enduring image from the fight in 2013 is Groves standing alone in the middle of the ring during the MC’s introductions. It is then he decides to stare down not only Froch but Froch’s entire team, who almost shield Froch by standing in front of him.
4) That right hand
A shock to all but Groves, the right hand the Londoner landed in round one was not only perfect in its execution but would have ended the night of most other opponents. Yet against Carl Froch it would require far more than just a single right hand to keep a tough man down.
5) Two right hands
What made Groves’ fast start all the more impressive was that it was something he predicted, with an eerie accuracy, just two days before at the pair’s final press conference. He mentioned that afternoon that he would land two right hands – just two – in round one and that Froch would feel the impact of them.
6) Sixth-round carnage
While the first round was the most dramatic, and the most shocking, it was arguably in round six that Groves demonstrated his brilliance, peppering Froch with any number of shots and leaving the Nottingham man having to call upon all his resources of strength just to keep up.
7) Cobra tough
For as much as Groves was praised during the fight and its aftermath for his display of skill, it is over time one learns to appreciate the sheer courage and resilience Froch showed in winning the fight in the manner in which he did.
8) Foster intervenes
The talking point to end all talking points, once Foster decides in round nine that he has seen enough and that Groves doesn’t deserve the chance to return fire, much less hit the deck, the rivalry immediately becomes something else. Something bigger. Something better.
9) Inevitable rematch
As far as keeping their rivalry in the news and lucrative, there could be no better outcome for both than to have fight number one end the way it did. After all, with a plot twist provided by a referee’s intervention, there was now added life given to what, in other hands, might have been just another stoppage win for Froch.
10) The authenticity
Almost an artifact from a bygone era now, Froch vs. Groves was the last great British boxing rivalry and predates a lot of the content creation, YouTube video channels, and social media accounts we see today, all of which, at the expense of insight and storytelling, encourage potentially genuine rivals to ham it up for attention.
