Chris Billam-Smith and Isaac Chamberlain could be fighting for a world title shot on July 30.
The two cruiserweights meet at the Bournemouth International Centre, live on Sky Sports, giving Billam-Smith home advantage.
On the line are the home fighter’s European and Commonwealth titles but a shot at new IBF World champion Jai Opetaia is a potential carrot too.
The Australian’s manager Dean Lonergan told Sky Sports Toe2Toe boxing podcast that he would like to get on with making the fight happen.
“I’m not reaching out to have a chat, I’m reaching out to see if we can actually do some business.”
“I’d like to start talking now with [Boxxer CEO] Ben Shalom because they’re all signed to him, I believe, and with Adam Smith [Head of Sky Boxing] and to have a serious conversation about us coming there or you guys coming to Australia and trying your hand at what is now the best cruiserweight in the world.”
Opetaia shocked the cruiserweight division beating the number one fighter Mairis Briedis on points in Australia 12 days ago despite breaking his jaw in two places.
The 37-year-old had only ever lost to current Unified Heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk before defending his IBF title against the new kid on the block.
Billam-Smith and Chamberlain On Opetaia
A motivated Billam-Smith and Chamberlain gave their opinion of Opetaia to Sky Sports beginning with the current European champion
“He’s a really difficult fight for anyone in the division. He is the number one in the world at the moment, only because he’s beaten the number one.”
“I think there’s obviously flaws in everyone but he’s really well schooled, does the basics very well. There’s nothing amazing about him, he just does the basics very, very well.”
While Chamberlain, who fought and lost to current WBO World champion Lawrence Okolie in 2018, said:
“[Opetaia] is athletic, he has good hand speed as well, but he was facing an ageing Briedis, so it’s hard to really judge on that performance.”