Roy Jones Jr subtly criticized Liam Smith before his match with Chris Eubank Jr, claiming that Eubank was capable of beating Smith without him commenting.
Eubank has been training under the former world champion in the weight division since 2021 and has won three comfortable victories since.
Although Smith is a former world champion who has had an impressive 2022, Jones says Sports sky that his work with ‘Next Gen’ has gone towards getting the 33-year-old ready to battle the likes of Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez and Gennady Golovkin.
“For Liam Williams or Liam Smith, Chris doesn’t need me to beat these people because Chris Eubank can beat both of them.
“However, he didn’t put me in for these particular fighters, he brought me here to help him better prepare for the likes of GGG. [Golovkin] or Canelo”
“When you go with these guys you can’t be the old Chris just going out and letting go, you have to be a tactician, you have to have a little more knowledge behind what you’re doing.”
“He’s looking at the bigger fights where he knows he’s going to need more than just knocking people out with combos that won’t work against these bigger guys, before Canelo or GGG.”
Jones’ words echo Eubank’s comment shortly after the match against Smith was announced, when he claimed he only needed to be active at 50% to win on January 21.
Despite the obvious confidence from Jr and his team, he entered the match as just a favorite bettor for the bookies on the sidelines and many in the boxing world were backing Smith. top.
There is also the issue of Eubank’s rematch clausethey have the option to activate if defeated.
The contest, which is Sky Sports’ first pay-per-view service of the year, will take place in the 160lbs at Eubank’s home, with Smith up from 154lb for the first time in his career.
