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Carl Froch retires: Former world champion ends boxing career
Britain’s four-time world super-middleweight champion Carl Froch has retired from boxing.
The 38-year-old won 33 of his 35 fights, with 24 victories by knockout.
Froch has not fought since he knocked out George Groves to retain the WBA and IBF titles in May 2014.
“I have nothing left to prove and my legacy speaks for itself. I’m incredibly proud of what I have achieved in boxing but now is the right moment to hang up my gloves,” he said.
Speaking to Sky Sports, where he will now work as a boxing pundit, Froch added: “If I could fight again physically I would, but mentally I’m not sure. I think the desire has gone.
“There will always be options and it’s never going to stop. There will always be someone next in line to take my scalp. If that never goes away, when am I ever going to retire?
“There’s still a fire in the belly but it’s been too long now. I don’t know if I can go one more time.”
Froch first revealed he was thinking about quitting last June, after his rematch with Groves in front of 80,000 people at Wembley.
They had originally fought in November 2013 when Froch won via a controversial ninth-round stoppage.
The former English, British and Commonwealth champion wanted to secure bouts in Las Vegas and his hometown of Nottingham before stopping.
Froch knocked George Groves out with a huge right hand in the eighth round of their rematch last year
But a clash with Mexican Julio Cesar Chavez Jr in Vegas in March fell through after Froch suffered an elbow injury, and talks over potential bouts against 50-year-old Bernard Hopkins and Kazakhstan’s Gennady Golovkin did not lead to fights.
Froch’s only defeats in his 13-year professional career came against Mikkel Kessler in 2010 and American Andre Ward in 2011, although he beat the Dane in a 2013 rematch.
He first won a world title in December 2008 by claiming the WBC belt in a points win over Canada’s Jean Pascal in Nottingham.
In his first defence he stopped Jermain Taylor with seconds remaining in the final round when he was well behind on two scorecards.
After losing to Kessler, he regained the WBC belt with a points win over Arthur Abraham in 2010, before adding the IBF and WBA titles later in his career.
Carl Froch’s life in boxing |
|---|
| Born: Nottingham, 2 July 1977 |
| Amateur honours: ABA middleweight champion, 1999 & 2001; World Amateur bronze, 2001 |
| Turned pro: 16 March 2002 |
| Pro record: 35 fights, 33 wins (24 KOs), two defeats |
| Pro honours: WBC, WBA, IBF super-middleweight champion, former English, British and Commonwealth champion |
| Best wins: Jean Pascal (PTS, 2008); Jermain Taylor (KO12, 2009); Lucian Bute (KO5, 2012); Mikkel Kessler (PTS, 2013); George Groves (TKO8, 2014) |
Froch vacated his IBF belt in February, saying that a bout against mandatory challenger James DeGale did not make “financial or business sense” and “would not get me out of bed”.
Londoner DeGale, 29, called Froch a “coward” before going on to beat American Andre Dirrell to claim the title in Boston in May.
BBC Sport