Hassan N'Dam N'Jikam v Peter Quillin

In recent months the Middleweight division has really come alive with Gennady Golovkin defeating Grzegorz Proksa (WBA interim), Daniel Geale defeating Felix Sturm (IBF and WBA "Super") and Sergio Martinez defeating Julio Cesar Chavez Jr (WBC and Ring). Now we get to see the current WBO champion Hassan N'Dam N'Jikam (27-0, 17) try to defend his title for the first time as he faces the highly regarded Peter Quillin (27-0, 20).

Despite not being well known outside of mainland European N'Dam N'Jikam is well regarded as a talented boxer-puncher though many question his credentials so far and especially the way in which has has been crowned world champion, which saw Russian Dmitry Pirog controversially stripped of his belt.


Whilst many may not like the way N'Dam N'Jikam got his title, the Cameroonian born Frenchman is a very talented fighter who moves excellently and has fantastic hand speed. His ability has seen him not only recording 27 victories but also scoring several notable victories including defeating the likes of Gennady Martirosyan, Avtandil Khurtsidze, Giovanni Lorenzo and the well regarded Max Bursak. As well as those victories he also been the WBA interim champion and the WBO interim champion.

In terms of his style N'Dam N'Jikam is an impressive boxer, he moves well and looks very loose in the ring, however his power does seem lacking and many question whether or not he can cope with really top class fighters. In fact many felt that Avtandil Khurtsidze did enough to deserve the victory over him last year in easily the toughest bout of N'Dam N'Jikam's career so far. With his speed and movement however N'Dam N'Jikam is a problem for most fighters in the division and will not be easy to beat.

Interestingly, since debuting in 2004 N'Dam N'Jikam has only fought in France, Morocco and Luxembourg, in fact 24 of his 27 bouts to date have taken place in France. With this up coming bout taking place in America, this could be a key factor.

Despite being the challenger, American based Peter Quillin is the big favourite (priced around 4/11) and with good reason. Not only is the fight going to take place in America but Quillin is seen by many as the best Middleweight not to have fought for a world title yet.

Quillin, like N'Dam N'Jikam, is seen as a very talented fighter, however Quillin appears to have much more sting on his shots than the champion and has shown his hurtful power on a number of well known opponents. In fact 5 of Quillin's last 6 opponents failed to survive the distance with only Ronald "Winky" Wright managing to see the scheduled and even he was dropped.

Whilst the victory over Wright was the highest profile of Quillin's career he also holds victories over Craig McEwan, Jessie Brinkley, Fernando Zuniga, Dionisio Miranda and a faded Antwun Echols. All credible and solid victories against fringe title level competition.

In terms of his style Quillin is a fighter who is able to box excellently and has fast heavy hands hands.  He's unlikely to apply a huge amount of pressure but he is very patient and a very accurate counter puncher who has a wonderfully effective jab when he decides to actually use it (it has been under-utilised in the past).

In terms of this fight I think we're going to see a high paced chess match early on as the fighter take a round or two to figure each other out. Don't expect it to be very exciting but expect to see a lot posing and a lot of looking for openings before it opens up a bit in the middle portion of the bout. Expect by round 9 or 10 for both fighters to have finally warmed into the bout before Quillin lets his hands go and really looks to make a point before stopping N'Dam N'Jikam late. However by the same respect if Quillin can hurt N'Dam N'Jikam early expect him to go for the kill earlier.

Prediction-Quillin TKO 11