Carl Froch: George Groves' games won't upset me again

[Mofo2]

"I carried a lot of anger into the first fight with George and it certainly impacted on my performance," he says of the victory which retained his IBF and WBA super-middleweight belts.

"He got under my skin and when I was inside the ring, I just wanted to fight him rather than box him.

"That was down to the way he was acting in the build-up, but it led to mistakes.

"I didn't stick to my principles and the way I operate like working behind my jab and even though I won, it was my worst possible night.

"The psychologist I am working with helps the Team GB Olympic team and it's something that I have always been interested in.

"It was part of my sports science degree I completed at university and if you look around be it teams or individuals, they are becoming more and more widely used."

If the psychology behind the fighters is fascinating then so too is that of many boxing fans who will be part of the 80,000 crowd heading to Wembley in just under eight weeks' time.

Groves was booed into the ring but cheered out within the space of an hour after Howard Foster controversially stopped the fight in Froch's favour.

The transformation was fascinating given not many had cared for the super-middleweight's cockiness in the build-up.

But, out of all the thinkers who have their theories on why that was, it was the footballer Joey Barton who made a clever observation.

"We love unlucky losers in this country," he said.

"We love the side that gets heroically beaten and hate sides that are successful."

It is clear Groves has significantly more support in this fight than he did in the first, but Froch who has hundreds of thousands of fans all across the world, remains unfazed.

"This country loves an underdog and it really does not matter what sport," he said.

"We've seen it in football when non-league teams play the Premier League teams in the FA Cup.

"And it's the same in boxing, tennis and so on. George is the underdog and he will have people supporting him on that basis alone.

"But that does not faze me in the slightest because I understand the mentality.

"But when it's just me and George inside the ring, that doesn't matter. They won't be able to help him.

"And that's what it will boil down to: him and me."