One more win – Eddie Hearn lays out Tommy McCarthy world title plan
Defeat Chris Billam-Smith [12(10)-1] at Fight Camp and Tommy McCarthy [18(9)-2(1)] will be in prime position for a world title shot suggests Eddie Hearn.
Within minutes of strapping the European title over his shoulder late last year, McCarthy was calling for a world title shot.
‘The Mac Attack’ has since name-dropped all four belt holders – Arsen Goulamarian (WBA), Mairis Briedis (IBF), Lawrence Okolie (WBO) and Ilunga Makabu (WBC) – and continually expressed a desire to challenge them.
A successful mandatory defence was registered over the weekend, McCarthy defeated Alexandru Jur in the kind of style he had hoped would prompt world title talk.
However, ‘Big Tommy’ has agreed to take what he previously called a step back to settle an out of nowhere grudge with Billam- Smith and signed for a fight Irish-boxing.com’s Joe O’Neill argues is the biggest Ireland vs England clash since Frampton Quigg.
Come through that in Fight Camp and Hearn believes a world title shot will be next.
“I’m delighted to officially welcome Tommy to the Matchroom team,” said the Matchroom Sport Chairman when McCarthy signed a promotional deal with the company this week.
“Tommy took the risk to travel to Italy against [Fabio] Turchi and followed it up by winning the European Title and successfully defending it on Saturday. Now we’ve made a cracker between Tommy and Chris Billam-Smith for Fight Camp and the winner is going to be perfectly placed to go on and challenge for a World Title.”
Manager Mark Dunlop heralded the promotional link up as reward for taking the tough fights in recent years and believes it’s a step along the road to bringing Matchroom back to Belfast.
“I am delighted that Tommy has been rewarded by Eddie and Frank with this amazing promotional agreement for this loyalty and bravery over the past three years,” said McCarthy’s manager Mark Dunlop. “He now joins stablemate James Tennyson in the most amazing and powerful promotional company in the world and looks forward to bringing big time boxing back to Belfast.”
