PADDY Fitzpatrick claims there is a huge question mark hanging over Carl Froch about his physical state.

Froch defends his WBA and IBF super-middleweight titles against Fitzpatrick’s boxer George Groves on Saturday night at Wembley in a hugely-anticipated rematch.

After the first fight back in November where Froch was exposed by Groves like never before, Fitzpatrick expressed concerns about whether the champion could box again, bearing in mind the punishment he had inflicted on him.

Ahead of the pair’s rematch tonight, Fitzpatrick has maintained those claims and also revealed that Team Groves asked the British Boxing Board of Control to carry out a medical check on Froch ahead of the fight without success.

“These are major concerns,” Fitzpatrick said of the punishment Froch has taken throughout his career and in particularly in the first fight against Groves.

“You have a fighter who is older who has been there in the trenches that many times but all the times that he was in the trenches, all the fights that he was in when he earned that warrior tag, he earned that warrior tag for going through less then he went through last time (against George) that night.

“So I wrote to the board of control and sent the letter through Neil Sibley, who is George’s attorney, not because of any other reason that I want it taken seriously. And they sent us back one line, if it’s two I’m mistaken, it was one line and it was like “we got this”.

Fitzpatrick expects Groves to hand out further punishment to Froch on Saturday and says he is disappointed with the board’s response to his request and claims they are letting down licence holders in the process.

“I was very disappointed with the board of control’s reaction to us in every department,” said Fitzpatrick about the way the board dealt with the controversial stoppage of the first fight.

“So they either think I am making a genuine concern or they think I am just trying to play some game and complain.

“If they think I am trying to play some game what about everyone else that said he took so much punishment?

“What about everyone else seeing what he went through?

“And if I am writing seriously out of concern then you should show more respect and write back more than one line.

“ The board of control haven’t conducted themselves right, they work for us we don’t work for them, they work for the licence holders.

“They are supposed to make sure the fighters are protected and that everyone who has a licence is protected and are taken seriously and they haven’t done that.

“They are annoyed that we are vocal in our opinion when our opinion does not marry up with theirs.

“Shame on them.”

Froch and Groves weighed in at Wembley yesterday with the champion hitting the scales at 11st 13lb 9oz while the challenger came in lighter at 11st 12lb 4oz.