by Stuart Young – With the careers of established world stars Joe Calzaghe & Clinton Woods at an end, the impending retirements of former world champions Ricky Hatton & Junior Witter seemingly no more than a few fights away (at best) our heavyweights hopefuls, Danny Williams, Martin Rogan & Matt Skelton reputations laying in tatters, entertaining domestic level fighters like Ryan Rhodes, Jamie Moore & Michael Jennings all the wrong side of 30, with neither of the trio ever making the breakthrough to world class, Alex Arthur & Enzo Maccarinelli’s continual underperforming, leading many to suggest that neither will never fulfil their potential..
You could be forgiven for thinking there was an air of ‘doom & gloom’ around British boxing at the moment, perhaps a void that looks too big to fill, maybe this is how it would appear to ‘an outsider’ that we were heading for a sustained period in the international wilderness as far as a dearth in world class fighters go – or at least a period of lull while we find & develop some new raw talent.
Well fear not, I’m here to bring the good news – the talent is already being ‘honed’ & we already have established world champions to keep us ‘ticking over’ so to speak – talents like, new WBA heavyweight champion David ‘The Hayemaker’ Haye, unbeaten WBC super-middleweight champion Carl ‘The Cobra’ Froch & Freddie Roach trained ‘speedster’ WBA light-welterweight champion Amir Khan.
We possess ‘solid’ European champions like Matthew Macklin (middleweight) Paul McCloskey (light-welterweight) & Rendall Munroe (super-bantamweight) who will all be hoping to challenge for world honours in the next 12 months.
Britain also possesses a highly talented batch of unbeaten prospects & potential ‘diamonds in the rough’ such as Welshman Nathan Cleverly, Sheffield’s Kell Brook, Manchester’s John Murray, London’s ‘Dazzling’ Darren Barker & ‘Cockney wideboy’ Dagenham’s very own Kevin Mitchell – many inside the sport feel these fighters are just one breakthrough fight away from establishing their names to a wider, world audience.
We have former Olympians such as James Degale, Billy-Joe Saunders, Tony Jeffries, David Price & Joe Murray already learning their trade in the paid ranks, world amateur gold medallist Frankie Gavin making a seemingly seamless transition into the professional game & highly touted unbeaten prospects such as Tyson Fury, Derek Chisora, Paul Appleby, George Groves Jamie Cox & Denton Vassell all ‘potentially’ world class operators.
There is no doubt the future is bright – in a few years Britain could be basking in a ‘golden age’.
America, brace yourself for a brand new British Invasion, because mark my words….. “the British are coming”