Frank Warren has suffered a further setback as it today emerged that Joe Calzaghe will sue his former promoter.
Calzaghe has claimed he is owed some £2million in unpaid fees accumulated from his 2008 bout with Bernard Hopkins. This is the second time “The Pride of Wales” and his former promoter have faced each other in court - last year Warren tried to sue Calzaghe for £1million on the basis that he had said he would fight one more fight before retiring. That backfired spectacularly and Warren ended up having to pay Calzaghe £1.8million plus court costs.
The last court ruling forced Warren to put his company Sports Network in to administration as a result of the judge’s decision. Calzaghe is now claiming Warren did this in order to run down the company and avoid paying Calzaghe the money he is owed.
Calzaghe retired in 2009 undefeated, having unified the super-middleweight division. He had a 10-year relationship with Warren who he signed for after starting out with Terry Lawless and Mike Duff. In court during the original trial Calzaghe’s lawyers said that Calzaghe and Warren’s relationship “had clearly deteriorated significantly, at least as far as Mr Calzaghe was concerned.
"Mr Calzaghe felt that Mr Warren had taken advantage of him for a number of years and Mr Calzaghe wanted to extricate himself from his management and promotional relationships with Mr Warren."
This is not the first case of Warren falling out with one of his top fighters. Ricky Hatton split with Warren after the Londoner and Hatton’s father had an argument about money that caused an acrimonious break-up - indeed, the pair are still feuding to this day. Warren also had a similar falling out with Prince Naseem Hamed after Hamed’s brother started playing a bigger role in the fighter’s career and negotiating with other promoters. Then last month Warren lost one of the most promising talents in the country when Amir Khan left to join Golden Boy Promotions.
On top of that Warren’s latest promotion, Saturday's “Night of Champions” at Wembley Arena has turned into a night of no champions. Headliners Danny Williams and Sam Sexton have both pulled out, Sexton withdrew injured and Derek Chisora was lined up to face Williams before “The Brixton Bomber” pulled one of his vanishing acts. That left late replacement Chisora having to face even later replacement Carl “The Fridge” Baker, who is essentially a club fighter. After that top prospect Kell Brook pulled out and it leaves only Nathan Cleverly and Kevin Mitchell who should both come through their fights comfortably, sans excitement.
However if there ever was a man who could bounce back up from any setback its Frank Warren.
He’s been shot, he’s been sued, he’s lost a small fortune on the London Arena, he’s lost every top boxer he has ever had and yet he is still the number one boxing promoter in the whole country.
The man is like a rubber ball – so don’t bet on him not bouncing back again.
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