A peak Nigel Benn against the undefeated Joe Calzaghe “The Pride of Wales”. Who wins?
Calzaghe’s stand out fight has to be the mauling he gave against Jeff Lacy who also had a fearsome reputation going in against Calzaghe.
It could be quite easy to build a case in which Calzaghe would simply outclass Benn and win by late stoppage or on points but then again a case could be built for Benn to knockout Calzaghe with a murderous punch from nowhere which stopped many opponents such as Iran “The Blade” Barkley in their tracks.
The Benn, Eubank and Watson era was a fascinating era of boxing in the late 80s and early 90s while Calzaghe answered his critics to some extent by going to America and beating Roy Jones Jr. and Bernard Hopkins but it would not be controversial to say that both Jones Jr. and Hopkins had seen better days as fighters and were clearly past their best.
Benn’s 8th round KO against McCllelan seemed impossible when in the 1st round he was knocked literally out of the ring in what many even 23 years later consider the most epic win in a British ring which would not have seen out of place in a Rocky movie.
Check out the best of The Dark Destroyer and The Pride of Wales and give your opinion on who wins the fight in their prime.