Warrington fixes world title tilt in his sights for next year

Josh Warrington pictured during an open training session at The Light in Leeds yesterday (
Picture: Jonathan Gawthorpe). — Josh Warrington pictured during an open training session at The Light in Leeds yesterday ( Picture: Jonathan Gawthorpe).

Warrington is already a European, Commonwealth and British featherweight champion and takes on Dennis Tubieron in an official eliminator for the WBC world featherweight title at First Direct Arena in Leeds on Saturday evening.

The victor will also pick up the vacant WBC international crown, but Warrington already has world title bouts on his mind with the 24-year-old dreaming of becoming world champion as soon as next year.

The build-up to Saturday’s Sky Sports-televised fight continued yesterday when Warrington held an open training session at The Light in Leeds, four days before a fight that will be witnessed by a crowd of 10,000 inside the arena.

Former Leeds United favourite Vinnie Jones will join the featherweight for the walk on, and be present at Friday’s weigh-in, also at The Light.

Warrington hopes that his first fight at a world level will prove only the beginning.

He told The Yorkshire Post: “We could have a world title next year – 100 per cent.

“It seems like we have skipped a couple of chapters as we have won the Commonwealth title so we had a great start.

“Then we won the British and then we stepped up to European level. We blasted out the mandatory European challenger in four rounds and we made it look easy.

“I have already got a mandatory challenger on that one as well so I’ll be looking at that a little later down the line, but this will be a little taste of breaking on to the world scene.

“If I can deal with this on Saturday then I hope it can show that I can get to world level.

“It’s the biggest fight of my career so far.

“It’s a world title eliminator so if I win this one I’ll be at that world level and hopefully, later down the line such as next year, I’ll be looking at a big world title fight.”

Several hundred people stepped in from the sunshine to see Warrington in action during yesterday’s training session and the featherweight said: “It’s nice of them to come down and just a little glimpse of what is to come on Saturday night. The prospect of 10,000 people being at first Direct Arena is unbelievable. There will be a hell of an atmosphere.”