By Edward Chaykovsky

Super middleweight contender Martin Murray believes George Groves is not the same fighter after suffering back to back knockout defeats at the hands of Carl Froch in 2013 and 2014.

Groves was able to rebuild following those bouts, gained a mandatory position under the World Boxing Council and went for another world title. He suffered another setback after getting dropped and then losing a twelve round split decision last September to WBC champion Badou Jack.

Murray (33-3-1, 16 KOs) is also rebuilding after getting knocked out early last year by middleweight king Gennady Golovkin.

The two fighters will collide in a WBA world title eliminator at London's O2 Arena on June 25. The bout will be the Sky Sports Pay-Per-View co-feature to Anthony Joshua's first defense of the IBF heavyweight title against Dominic Breazeale.

While Groves (23-3, 18KOs) has promised to retire Murray, the same prediction is being made in the other direction.

"The Carl Froch fights took something out of him," Murray told scribe Nick Parkinson. "He's not looked the same fighter since and got put down and lost again against Jack. There has always been issues with his stamina and he's been hurt a few times now.

"The Froch fights took a massive amount of confidence out of him. When he fought the Italian [Andrea Di Luisa in January], he didn't look right, he looked shot. He didn't have any confidence. He didn't get much back in that fight or against David Brophy [in April], but he didn't show much ambition."

"I really can't think about losing so I can't think about retirement if l lose like he says. I feel I'm only just getting into my prime and he's saying that because he knows if he gets beat it's retirement for him. There's as much pressure on him in this fight as there is on me, it's a 50-50 fight, but I'm so confident going into this. I've got so much more to give and I've not even thought about losing. When George gets beat it's him who goes into retirement."