By Mark Vester

At the Trent FM Arena in Nottingham, the packed house saw a fight of the year contender as Carl Froch (24-0, 19KOs) showed his worth in a twelve round war, winning a unanimous decision over Jean Pascal (21-1, 14KOs) to capture the vacant WBC super middleweight title. The scores were 118-110, 117-111 and 116-112.

The first three rounds were all out action, with both men throwing bombs and landing big shots. Froch appeared to land the harder blows. In the fourth, the fight slowed down for the first two minutes and the two began to go to war again the final minute. At this point, Froch's hometown crowd was on their feet.

Froch started jabbing in the fifth. Pascal would jump in and counter with his hard right hand. A highlight reel exchange saw both fighters land bombs at the same exact time to send the crowd into a frenzy. Just as Pascal was hit, he rocked Froch with a combination at the bell. Froch started using the jab again in the sixth and began to pick his punches. Pascal was rocked a few times by Froch's combinations.

The seventh was more big exchanges by both. Pascal began to look tired at this point and his right eye was swelling bad. Froch rocked him a few times with the uppercut, body shots and left hooks. During some wild exchanges in the eight, Froch was cut around the left eye.

Pascal made his stand in the ninth, pounding away at a tired Froch for most of the round, until Froch stunned Pascal near the end of the final minute and tried to finish him as the clock ran out. Nottingham chants rang out in the tenth as the crowd tried to lift Froch back. He used his boxing skills and jab to bloody Pascal's nose.

Froch was boxing again in the eleveth, until Pascal buzzed with a right hand and the two would once again go back to trading big punches. Froch seemed to have more energy, not by much, and was landing the better shots. In the twelfth and final round, they came to the middle and started throwing big punches. The crowd was on their feet, Froch continued to come on as Pascal once again began to tire. They started trading big punches once again in the closing seconds. The crowd stood up on their feet to applaud both men.

Froch will now have to defend his title against mandatory challenger Jermain Taylor, who won his position with a recent domination of Jeff Lacy.

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