‘Relentless’ Alen Babic big enough to wear Johnny Fisher down

Paschal Collins has dismissed suggestions that Alen Babic is too small to test Johnny Fisher.

The rivals fight at heavyweight on Saturday at the Copper Box Arena in London, where the undefeated Fisher, 25, is the favourite to win.

Babic, 33 and from Croatia, is fighting for the second time under Collins. He is also fighting for the second time since his only defeat – via a first-round stoppage inflicted by Lukasz Rozanski in the lightly regarded bridgerweight division.

That Poland’s Rozanski has since been stopped in a round by Lawrence Okolie, a natural cruiserweight, has made the aggressive Babic’s defeat by him look even more damaging – and the reality remains that there has never been any doubt that the physically maturing Fisher is fighting at his natural weight.

Collins in March led Babic to a stoppage victory over Steve Robinson. His fighter remains undefeated at heavyweight, and though he knows that Babic cannot risk trading with Fisher, Collins has already witnessed enough improvement, and a sufficient number of past victories for perceived undersized heavyweights, to be convinced that Babic can secure his highest-profile win.

“You get big heavyweights like [Jarrell Miller],” the Irishman said. “He can punch; he fights at a slow pace; tries to set up the punches. But then you get heavyweights like the [Rocky] Marcianos of the world – be relentless. You get fighters who move up the weights – really good fighters who have a certain style, who can use and utilise their style to their best ability and beat anybody. 

“John Ruiz – nobody said John Ruiz was going to lose to Roy Jones. James Toney beating Evander Holyfield. It’s bullshit. If you fight the right fight and have the right game plan, the weight difference – it doesn’t make any difference. Look at what Joseph Parker done to [Zhilei] Zhang and to Deontay Wilder. He’s a smaller man. He’s relentless. 

“With Alen, prior to working with me, he kind of hung his chin out a little bit. When I got Alen to the gym the first thing I did was tidy up that defence. Tighten up his defence. The same work-rate, but not waste too many shots. A lot of shots were wasted shots – missed shots. It’s balance; it’s reserve energy; throw the same amount of shots but don’t waste any, and keep the chin tucked in. 

“Johnny Fisher’s a good fighter. He’s a novice pro. There was talk of Johnny Fisher and Thomas Carty – my fighter. We were in Vegas in January, at the UFC Institute. Thomas was there; Johnny was there. They were quite funny with each other, because people were talking about them fighting eventually. 

“I called them and said, ‘Listen, you’re both novice pros, you’re not going to fight each other yet – for a long time’. Then I’m told, ‘Johnny Fisher’s gonna fight Alen Babic’. It’s an interesting fight – it really is – and I like Johnny Fisher. He’s a rugby player – it’s a contact sport, rugby. You’ve gotta be tough to play it. 

“The only thing I think will let Johnny down is his boxing ability. He’s gonna be there; he’s gonna be throwing punches. If he makes the mistake of trying to fight at the same pace as Alen Babic, which a lot of novices will try and do, I reckon four or five rounds, he just won’t have anything left.”

Collins and Babic are working together at the second time of asking.

“He came to me in December,” he said. “He came to me because I’d previously worked with Niall Kennedy, who boxed him [Babic won via stoppage in 2020]. He came over for a week; we hit it off. “It was interesting working with him, because he’s a pretty intense guy, but he’s my type of fighter – he puts it on fighters and stays on them but does it in a way where he’s not getting hit too much. Defensively he’s smothering the other guy’s work. 

“For this fight especially, Johnny Fisher can punch at long range and mid-range, so you’ve got to get right on his chest, and you’ve gotta throw shots inside his guard and drain him over time. It’s basically to put it on him for 10 hard rounds, and try and drain the fight out of Johnny Fisher. But at that range – at mid-range – he’s a dangerous fighter, ‘cause he’ll get inside them shots. 

“He’s intense even outside the gym; outside the ring; a very intense kind of person. He came across a very angry kind of man – an angry person. He’s not. It’s just his personality. When he comes to Dublin, he’s over for training camp and he’s in the zone. He’s like a method actor – he goes into character. I have it in Dublin for eight weeks. Sometimes it’s very tiring – sometimes I take a step away from it. But it’s just his thing so I just let him run with it.

“[The first time] he came to me and told me what he wanted to do and I told him to fuck off, and that was it.We hit it off, because I wouldn’t put up with his shit. ‘Someone here’s now telling me what to do.’ He’d said he was coming to Dublin to give me a trial, or some shite. ‘Who the fuck do you think you are? I’ll give you a trial. Now fuck off.’ Excuse the French. He fucked off. He went back to Croatia. He called me up and said, ‘Will you train me?’ I said, ‘Sure’. He knew that I’d take no shit, and he knew that this was the way you should fight. ‘You need to correct it, because if you don’t, I won’t waste my time.’ He got it, and he appreciated my honesty. 

“My brother Steve [the retired world champion] comes to Dublin once a week; once every two weeks. Steve will come in. ‘Here’s what you need to do as well.’ Alen could see the calibre of coaching he was getting, from myself but from my brother too, and he listens. He showed in his last fight against Robinson – Robinson must have the best chin in boxing, and also the worst corner. 

“We clicked, [post-Robinson] he went back to Croatia for two weeks, and then straight back to Dublin. Before this fight was even announced he came back to Dublin, and we’ve been working together – he’s living in Dublin. He’s got the best sparring; we have a game plan. It’s easier now. He knows me.”