British boxing is currently in trouble with Nick Ball the only male world champion across the sport – defending his WBA featherweight title leaves more at stake than just his belt
Chris McKenna is the Daily Star’s boxing correspondent and an expert voice on the ‘sweet science’, along with a hugely experienced football reporter, who primarily focuses on Merseyside giants Liverpool and Everton. He has covered world title fights all around the world, Champions League finals, FA Cup finals and Premier League title deciders.
Nick Ball puts his WBA featherweight title on the line against Aussie Sam Goodman and he also puts his crown as Britain’s only world champion at risk, too.
That’s male world champions. The women’s sport is in better health in this country with four females holding belts in their respective divisions.
There’s 18 divisions and 70 world titles for men because of the four major sanctioning bodies yet Britain has only one of them after Daniel Dubois lost the IBF heavyweight crown to Oleksandr Usyk last month Back in 2016, there were 14 champs from Britain in the world. Something is not right now.
Especially when fighters at the top level are earning more than ever before it seems thanks to the Saudi cash swirling around the game. Are British fighters being rushed more rather than protected and worked cleverly up the rankings for easier title shots?
There’s fighters on the fringes who could be world champions by the end of the year. Light-welterweight Dalton Smith is one as he looks set to face WBC champion Subriel Matias in November over in Riyadh.
Anthony Yarde faces a tough ask for the WBC light-heavyweight title against David Benavidez on the same night.
Galal Yafai has also rightly been reinstated as the mandatory challenger for the WBC flyweight champion and will get a crack at Ricardo Sandoval after a doping scandal surrounding previous foe Francisco Rodriguez.
Super-middleweight star Hamzah Sheeraz is close after a failed middleweight tilt last year, Nathaniel Collins is rising the ranks at featherweight while Sam Noakes is pushing at lightweight.
Denzel Bentley hovers around in middleweight rankings, with Josh Kelly having an outside chance of a shot at 11st.
Callum Smith could soon get a crack at a light-heavyweight title again if the belts get fractured further in that division.
Shabaz Masoud is there in the super-bantam rankings while Chris Billam-Smith may get another crack at a cruiserweight title in the next year
The only world title currently slated to be challenged for on these shores is happening in Belfast next month when hometown hope Lewis Crocker faces Irishman Paddy Donovan for the IBF welterweight crown.
British boxing has plenty of heavyweights at the moment but undisputed champion Usyk keeps beating them, which is a problem.
Ball should retain his crown as Britain’s only boxing king tonight, although unbeaten Goodman is no pushover ahead of a potential mammoth fight with Naoya Inoue next year.
But British boxing needs him to have company soon. The stakeholders in the sport need to sort it out.
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