Chris Eubank Jr has predicted that he will stop George Groves in their eagerly-anticipated title clash at the Manchester Arena on 17 February and does not believe his opponent's bigger size will be an advantage.

Following their respective wins over Avni Yildirim and Jamie Cox last year, the two British rivals and former sparring partners are set to lock horns in the World Boxing Super Series super-middle-weight semi-finals - a bout that also doubles up as a WBA and IBO unification fight.

The victor will go onto face either Liverpool's Callum Smith or two-time former light-heavyweight champion Jurgen Brahmer in the final in May, with that pair squaring off one week later in the Bavarian city of Nuremberg on 24 February.

Eubank Jr sealed a brutal third-round knockout of Yildirim in Stuttgart in October to advance in the elimination tournament and provide the second successful defence of the belt he took from Renold Quinlan last winter and is adamant that "the biggest fight of his career" will not last the distance after a "most effective and successful" training camp in Brighton left him in best-ever shape.

"I don't [think it will go 12 rounds]. Our fighting styles are too offensive and he doesn't hold a shot well," he told talkSPORT. "If you catch him clean, he's going to go. So I believe I will stop him before the [end] 12th round. 100%."

Eubank Jr, whose only professional loss to date came at the hands of Billy Joe Saunders, admits that Groves has an obvious edge when it comes to experience of title fights of this magnitude given his previous battles with Carl Froch (twice), Badou Jack and Fedor Chudinov, although the former middleweight does not believe that the natural size difference between the pair will work against him.

"The one thing I will give him is his experience, he is more experienced than me in terms of these world title fights," he said. "He's a year older than me, he is the bigger man... I don't see that as an advantage. I'm going to be light on my feet, I'm going to be fast, more focused and more vibrant than him I believe.

"He's going to be in there, I think, looking for that one-punch knockout, whereas I'm going to be flurrying, assaulting with barrages of punches. Eventually I'm going to catch him."

The inaugural 16-man World Boxing Super Series - regarded as essentially the "Champions League of boxing" - is also being contested at cruiserweight level, where Oleksandr Usyk and Murat Gassiev are due to meet in the final in Saudi Arabia in May with all four world titles and two undefeated records on the line.

Each winner could earn as much as $10m in prize money in addition to claiming a trophy named after the late Muhammad Ali.

Chris Eubank Jr and George Groves
Chris Eubank Jr and George Groves go head-to-head in an all-British showdown in Manchester next weekend Richard Heathcote/Getty Images