George Groves Leaves Adam Booth Before Biggest Fight Of His Life
By Niall Doran
It was to my amazement when I heard last week that George Groves and Adam Booth announced that they had split ahead of what will be by far Groves’ biggest fight of his career when he challenges fellow Englishman and world champion Carl Froch on November 23rd.
Initially I thought this might be some sort of mind game ploy from Adam Booth, who has been known through the years as a master tactician. But then I read yesterday that Groves had officially announced Irishman Paddy Fitzpatrick as his new head trainer ahead of his Sky Box Office blockbuster with “The Cobra” on November 23rd.
Groves already knows Fitzpatrick quite well having said “I am extremely happy to name Paddy Fitzpatrick as my new trainer going into what is the biggest fight of my life”.
“Although this is a fresh change for me, I’m working with someone I know and respect, and someone who knows my game inside out.”
“Paddy and I have worked closely together in the past and already have a very good relationship, one built over many years.
“Not only has he worked my corner for important fights, we have also spent a lot of time together when abroad on training camps, where Paddy has overseen a number of significant sessions.”
It all seems still to be a bit of a surprise for me. Adam Booth and George Groves seemed to have had built up a very close relationship over the years with Booth guiding his career to a perfect professional record thus far, brought him through a huge domestic pay per view fight against James De Gale, picked the right opponents at the right time and lately securing him the biggest fight of his career against Carl Froch.
I have done a bit of reading and to the best of my knowledge, neither Groves nor Booth has come out publicly yet and given an exact reason as to why the two have parted company. This is to be respected of course, but one at this particular time can only speculate as to what the reason was.
Groves appears to know his new trainer very well but it will be interesting to see does this have any adverse effects on his fight preparation so close to the most pressurised night of his professional career. Maybe he will be better than ever and shock the world by beating Froch, you never know in this funny old game.
I will be a keen spectator in the coming weeks to see what the real reason for the split between Groves and Booth really was. A really strange piece of boxing news lately for me that I can’t get me head around …
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