Carl Froch has some strong words for Liam Smith after his lacklustre performance against Chris Eubank Jr last month.
In their first meeting Smith became the first man to stop Eubank, blasting him out in the fourth round of their middleweight contest in January.
Going into the rematch, most predicted a similar outcome, but Eubank ripped up the script and put on arguably a career best performance to stop Smith late in the fight.
Speaking on talkSPORT Boxing, former super-middleweight world champion, Froch, accused Smith of “cheating the fans” after it came to light that the Liverpudlian had to lose 42lbs during camp.
“I don’t want to take anything away from Chris Eubank’s performance and I don’t want to write off Liam Smith too much, but Liam Smith was that bad. Liam Smith was awful and he just he looked dead on his feet from round one.
It transpired in the post-fight press conference that he took three stone off. Taking three stone off, 42 pounds in weight, being that drained going into the ring.
Not only is it dangerous but it is also kind of conning the fans, cheating the fans and the public when you are there to put a performance on and actually you have got no chance of putting a performance on because you are physically incapable.
That’s what it looked like from round one for me, he was on survival mode after the knockdown but before that he did nothing. It just wanted good enough for him.”
Smith’s trainer, Joe McNally, has since said that he would have liked the fight to have taken place later in the year due to injuries and subsequently stunted preparation.
Although Smith’s team have called for a trilogy fight, such was the one-sided nature of the contest it’s hard to believe there would be enough interest from fans to make it happen.