The Price is Right – Frampton agrees with heavy favourite tag ahead of Windsor mismatch

If you’re a gambler, the win markets this weekend won’t be for you.

Carl Frampton sits as a prohibitive 1/50 favourite for his big Windsor Park clash with Luke Jackson on Saturday night [August 18th], his shortest odds to win a fight since his Commonwealth title defence versus Prosper Ankrah in March 2012.

A tenner on ‘The Jackal’ to win will garner you a measly twenty pence profit should Frampton do the business.

Many will point out that odds in a two-horse race such as boxing is often skewed in favour of the favourite but Frampton feels the prices – which suggest there is a 98% chance that he will win this weekend – are accurate.

Riled up by Jackson, Frampton is out to do a demolition job this Saturday night at the Belfast football stadium and isn’t going to pretend that the fight is closer than it looks on paper.

“I don’t read into odds, but I imagine I am a strong favourite,” stated Frampton [25(14)-1(0)] who puts his WBO interim featherweight title on the line in the apparent mismatch.

“The bookies haven’t got it wrong because basically I want to do a number on this guy.”

“He can say what he wants, but he has never boxed at the level I have boxed at.”

“We talk about levels in this game and there are different levels. I have boxed at a very high level for a long time.”

“This is the first time he has mixed it at a high level and he is not going to be able to cope, especially coming to Belfast.”

It is quite heated talk from Frampton who has admitted that some of Jackson’s comments in the build-up have annoyed him, with the Tasmanian boxer taking aim at the Irishman’s amateur pedigree, commitment, weight, and suggesting he is over the hill.

The 31-year-old explained how the Australian “has been slightly disrespectful with the things he has said. He has tried to backtrack, but the bottom line is that he has said these things.”

“He has made his bed and he has to lay in it. He is getting it – he really is.”

While Frampton is ready to take out his anger and frustration on WBO #5 Jackson [16(7)-0], the Tiger’s Bay man is actually in a very happy place.

Now training in Manchester under former Irish, British, Commonwealth, and European light middleweight champ Jamie Moore, Frampton’s change from McGuigan’s Gym in London is serving him well.

Close friend Conrad Cummings has followed Frampton north from McGuigan’s Gym while fellow Irish boxer Steven Ward has also linked up with the VIP Gym that also boasts such talents as four-time world title challenger Martin Murray, British champions Jack Catterall and Rocky Fielding, and Commonwealth champ Tommy Coyle.

A high-spirited Frampton described how “the fight is very soon, but this camp has absolutely flown by. It doesn’t seem that long ago when we were in Tenerife and that was a couple of months ago.”

“It’s probably something to do with how much I am enjoying my boxing right now.

“I’m enjoying myself as a boxer and it is a good craic in the gym. There has been some great wins like Rocky and Martin recently.”

“There are good quality lads in the gym. We all train hard, but nobody takes themselves too seriously away from the boxing and that is the environment I like to be in.”

“We’re serious when we have to be, but there is a lot of light hearted stuff that goes on when it’s down time.”

“I met these boys last year, but we’re friends for life.”