Nick Westby: Adams’s bankable mixture of talent and charisma

From the minute she walked into the ring at the ExCel on Monday (was it really only four days ago?) Nicola Adams has been on a collision course with fame and fortune.

She has been the great entertainer, lighting up the black hole that is the boxing arena with swift counter-punching, a beaming smile and her now trademark Ali shuffle.

The biggest stage in women’s boxing – a historical first for the sport – was too much for some people, like world champion 
Savannah Marshall who was eliminated in her first bout.

Adams, by contrast, has owned the spotlight, revelling in it from the second she walked through the tunnel and out into the compact, atmospheric arena to the moment she disappeared under the stands after 15 minutes of delighting the crowd.

Even then, when she meets a press pack that has swelled with every win, the smile continues to radiate from her cherubic face as she spars with hacks eager to get a soundbite.

Boxing is a sport that rewards its showmen as much as its great fighters.

Think of all the high-profile fights Derek Chisora gets, compared with a far superior boxer in Carl Froch.

Adams combines the two: terrific ring ability with box-office presence.

The Olympics is renowned for being the launchpad for careers. Audley Harrison after Sydney and Amir Khan post-Athens, both prospered and made millions.

How the sport rewards its show-woman remains to be seen.

Boxing-wise, with a low-profile professional scene to speak of, staying on in the amateur game for another Olympic cycle is her preference.

Adams is now the standard-bearer for a sport that many will have looked upon prior to London 2012 with scepticism.

She is the face of women’s boxing in this country and she wants to use her achievement here this week to blaze a trail for the sport among women and girls.

With her box-office appeal, a life out of the ring could be equally tempting.

She already has the acting credentials – albeit minor walk-on parts in Emmerdale and Coronation Street – and guest appearances on a host of television shows now beckon.

What makes her ever more alluring is the adversity she has triumphed over.

Three years ago Adams broke her back and thought she would never fight again.

Three hundred sit-ups a day became none and for three months she lay on a bed worrying if her Olympic dream was over.

But she never lost the faith and within a year she was back in the final of the world championship in Barbados.

Now she is a historic Olympic champion.