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It goes without saying that Lucian Bute vs. Jean Pascal is the fight that boxing fans everywhere in Canada have been waiting to see for a long time now.
Even if there is no title belt on the line for this fight, both fighters have been vocal in the past few years that they are the best boxing product out of the great white north. On May 25th, both fighters will try to prove that they are the true champion of Canadian boxing.
Hall-of-fame boxer turned television analyst, Roy Jones Jr., was in Montreal on Tuesday to help promote the bout for HBO. According to Jones Jr., this fight will be explosive because both fighters hail from the same city, and that usually leads to a more explosive battle because of the hometown rivalry.
“It’s like two brothers in a household. Nobody fights harder than two brothers,” said Jones Jr.
During the press conference, both Jean Pascal and Lucian Bute spoke about the possibility that this fight might surpass in terms of popularity, the famous bout between Sugar Ray Leonard and Roberto Duran held in Montreal in June 1980.
Both fighters were extremely humble in their speeches regarding who is considered to be the favourite going into this fight. Both fighters actually joked around that they consider themselves to be the underdog for this fight.
Out of the two fighters, Bute has faced more world level competition. He holds victories over the likes of Sakio Bika, Librado Andrade, Edison Miranda and Glen Johnson. The only loss of his career was via fifth round TKO to Carl Froch, an opponent that Bute and Pascal has both faced and lost to.
Bute has not been the same fighter he once was after the KO from Froch. His key to victory against Pascal will be to push Pascal into aggression, as Hopkins did, and make Pascal into a one dimensional fighter which will be easy for the technical Bute to constraint.
For Pascal, this will be the biggest fight of his career. Not only is he fighting in his hometown, he is also fighting against another hometown hero in a fight that will elevate one combatant higher than the other.
Pascal’s greatest victory came against Chad Dawson, who at the time was an elite undefeated fighter. Pascal’s victory elevated him to a higher status in the world rankings following his loss to Carl Froch.
After the Dawson fight, Pascal had back to back fights against Bernard Hopkins; a draw and a loss. His keys to victory against Bute will be his aggression and possibly to psychologically bring up to Bute the hurt that Froch put on him.
