Despite losing his British, European and Commonwealth titles to Michael Hunter in 2005 and his defeat to current European champ Bernard Dunne last year, Esham Pickering still hopes he will get a world boxing title ahead of his clash with Marc Callaghan for the vacant British super bantamweight belt in Norwich on Friday.
“I would love revenge. I feel I beat Hunter and losing to him held up my career,” said Pickering, 30.
“I’ll show I’m ready for bigger fights against Marc Callaghan.”
Pickering added: “Marc is an experienced boxer, better than his record suggests and he gave Hunter two good fights so I’m expecting a real fight.
“A lot of people have written me off because I have been beaten at European level, but it wasn’t like I was out of my depth.
“I’ve got no excuses for Dunne. It was overwhelming boxing over in Ireland, but I chucked it away.
“He didn’t beat me up, he just out-boxed me later on. I had been inactive for a while before and that didn’t help.
“I would love to get revenge over those two and I have great belief I will be world champion one day.”
Since losing to Dunne, Pickering has sort of bounced back with a points victory over Frenchman Frederic Gosset in January, but there is still a long way to go, a big uphill climb, before he can challenge for a world title.
Can Pickering win a world title?
