Favorite Jack Catterall and Regis Progais faced off today for their 12-round light welterweight clash this Saturday, October 26th at the Co-op Live Arena in Manchester, England. The event will be shown live on DAZN.
Surprisingly, the two-time 140-lb champion Prograis (29-2, 24 KOs) is the underdog, and his career is literally on the line against the light-hitting defensive artist Catterall (29-1, 13 KOs).
In just one fight, Prograis, 35, has gone from being looked at as the #1 fighter in the light welterweight to a washed up ex-champion, fighting for career survival against against a guy that is seen as more domestic-level than a top ten guy.
Regis Must Use His Power to Win
Prograis is going to have to use his power to win this fight because Catterall has a negative style that involves a lot of jabbing, moving, and clinching. It’s ugly to watch, and it’s got to make it difficult for the judges because his shots have so little power. Regis will absolutely need to knock out Catterall to win because he’s the visitor, and he’s not likely to be given any favors by the judges.
In Cattterall’s last fight against Josh Taylor on May 25th in Leeds, he was getting hit hard, clinching, jabbing on running. The shots he landed were weaker, and he did a lot of holding that should have resulted in warnings and point deductions.
Catterall looked like a British version of Shakur Stevenson, making scoring the contest hard for the judges. After the fight, Taylor’s promoter, Bob Arum, erupted at the scores, feeling that the judges had given his fighter a raw deal. If Catterall was an American, he would be booed out of events, making his promoter look bad in front of the networks.
It’s not good for promotional companies to have runners that cause fans to boo. The network deals are like gold for promotional companies, and they can’t afford to have a boring fighters being placed in premium spots in headliners and booed.
“Just me being me and being the person that got there and enjoying myself,” said Regis Prograis to the Fight Hub TV channel about his approach to his clash against Jack Catterall on Saturday night. “I put too much pressure on myself, and I feel like I have to have goals.”
Prograis looked bad in his one-sided 12-round unanimous decision defeat to Devin Haney last year on December 9th. In hindsight, Prograis should focused on loading up with headshots because Haney was running and clinching all night against him.
Prograis should have trained to land short punches to catch Haney as he came in to hold, and he should have made him pay each time he attempted to grab. We saw how Ryan Garcia and Jorge Linares both hurt Haney when he was trying to hold them excessively, and he was close to being knocked out in both of those fights.
For Saturday’s fight, Prograis should have trained to deal with Catterall’s holding because that’s one of his main tools to neutralize the offense of his opponents. If Prograis can nail Catterall with point-blank shots in the clinch, he’s got an excellent chance of knocking him out because he’s going to be holding nonstop. He can’t help himself.
“I feel like in the last year, I lost myself, but right now, I’m getting back to being me. I overtrained and did so much other stuff,” said Prograis about his loss to Devin Haney last December. “Right now, we’re enemies. If I beat Jack Catterall, we may fight again. He still has a belt and I could fight him again.
“I wanted to be a two-time champion again, and I passed up a lot of opportunities at 147 for big money. People were like, ‘You’re crazy.’ Now, I have a goal. I want to be a three-time champion. That’s my goal. Now, I’m just going out and enjoying myself. I really love boxing.
“I’d rather fight a southpaw than an orthodox. I feel it’s easier to fight a southpaw,” said Prograis.
El Gato ⚔️ Rougarou@jack_catt93 and @RPrograis come face-to-face at the Etihad Stadium in the Manchester City Fan Zone 🔥#CatterallPrograis | @DAZNBoxing | #UCL pic.twitter.com/TrNQ6UmnTj
— Matchroom Boxing (@MatchroomBoxing) October 23, 2024
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