Floyd Mayweather‘s first fight on British shores against Aaron Chalmers hasn’t sold well. The O2 Arena looked virtually empty when the undercard started.
Promoters have struggled to shift tickets and were forced to offload them at a 20 per cent cut price in order to tempt punters into the 20,000-capacity venue. Not quite the reception the boxing legend would have hoped for in his first outing across the pond.
Chalmers marks TBE’s sixth opponent in his post-retirement career. Since hanging up his gloves in 2017 with a perfect professional record of 50-0, Mayweather has continued to compete in money-spinning non-scoring bouts against YouTubers, kickboxers and everything in between. Last time out, he stopped KSI’s brother Deji Olatunji and is now set to do battle with ex-Geordie Shore star Chalmers.
Despite being best known for his time on the hit reality television show, Chalmers is no stranger to combat sports. The Joker is a former professional MMA fighter and active pro boxer with a winning record in both disciplines (5-2 MMA and 1-0 boxing). He was also signed by top MMA promotion Bellator for a time.
Ahead of the feature attraction, Chalmers caught up with Express Sport and gave his thoughts on the mammoth task in front of him. “I’d like to think I’m a better boxer than Deji and Deji caught him, he blacked his eye so that’s a big confidence boost for me. And if Deji can black his eye then there’s a chance I will catch him on more than one occasion,” he said.
“I’m also going to be a lot bigger than Floyd, I’m six foot, I’m cutting down to 72kg and I punch quite hard. I’m not saying that he hasn’t been in there with people that can punch but I can punch as well.
“It’s going to be an interesting night more me and like I say the more I do the better it stands me for future reference. I see an absolute tear up,” Chalmers added. “I know me and I know if the going gets tough then I will have to bite down and start swinging.”